Little Sympathy for China’s Struggling College Graduates.
The Chinese media has made much in recent weeks over a study showing nearly 70 percent of recent university graduates earn less than the average monthly income of a migrant worker.
But in spite of the shocking headlines, many commentators say that the situation is completely normal, a natural result of recent changes in China’s employment landscape and a fair deal for overworked laborers and students with diplomas but little real experience.
China Youth Daily noted the rapid expansion of university enrollment in recent years, saying that there has been a transformation from “elite education” to “mass education.”
The official newspaper of the country’s Communist Youth League, China Youth Daily first reported the study last month, but took a measured tone in interpreting its results.
“’Level of education’ is not the only standard for determining how high or low someone’s salary will be. We must also consider the industry, the position, and other factors.”
“Students and migrant workers are completely different groups,” the article continued, saying that because of the clear difference between mental and physical labor, the two groups “honestly can’t be compared.”
The article went on to say that the belief that migrant workers’ income should be lower than that of new graduates is based upon “society’s long-term discrimination” against migrants.
“Considering their working environment and the difficulty of their jobs, migrant workers’ income should have gone up long ago,” the newspaper said.
Columnist Wang Junrong of the Wuhan Morning Post agreed, declaring himself to be “truly disgusted” by “never-ending” comparisons between students and migrant workers.
At the same time, many commentators listed reasons why recent graduates did not necessarily deserve high salaries.
“They lack real work experience, and most require the help and guidance of seasoned coworkers to be able to finish their work without any problems,” said the Chongqing Morning Post.
“This is why 70 percent of graduates have a salary less than 2,000 yuan.”
Others cautioned that undeservedly high salaries would be harmful to graduates in the long run.
“How many successful people’s first steps were difficult?” asked the Spring City Evening News. “In those [early] years, the richest man in Asia Li Ka-shing was still just a salesman.”
The newspaper dismissed hand-wringing over graduates’ supposedly low salaries. “This kind of attitude leaves students with no way to quietly contemplate their future career and no way to find their role.”
“The final result is that they can only live obsessing over their salary, and end up losing themselves.”
Read more at http://asiancorrespondent.com/87456/little-sympathy-for-chinas-struggling-college-grads/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Showing posts with label China. Show all posts
Monday, September 3, 2012
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Linguistic Imperialism Alive and Kicking
Linguistic Imperialism Alive and Kicking.
Topics reported on recently in Learning English give me grounds for concern about internationally driven efforts to strengthen the learning of English. They suggest strongly that TESOL/ELT is part of the problem rather than the solution. There is increasing evidence that what is on offer may in fact cause educational failure.
My worries were triggered by two shocking headlines (Learning English, 13 January). One reports on the massive failure in Namibia of English as the main medium of education: "Language policy 'poisoning' children". This was the conclusion of a recent NGO study. The second was "Language myth cripples Pakistan's schools". The myth is the belief that studying English is all you need for success in life. Policies influenced by this myth prevent most children from accessing relevant education.
I am also strongly concerned about a third story, "US launches global push to share ELT skills". The background is that in November 2011 the US state department and Tesol International Association (recently renamed) announced a partnership to meet the global demand for English and to "Work in co-ordination with US companies, universities, publishers, and other ELT stakeholders to enhance their international outreach and operations". This drive is modelled on the success of the British Council in expanding British influence worldwide. There are examples in the 17 February issue of Learning English: Tony Blair promoting British ELT in Thailand; the UK taking a "role in Ukraine primary push".
Is Anglo-American expertise really relevant in all such contexts? In fact educational "aid" worldwide does not have a strong record of success. There is scholarly evidence, for instance from Spain, that primary English is not an unmitigated success story: quite the opposite.
For Namibia a great deal of educational language planning was undertaken at the United Nations Institute for Namibia prior to independence. I summarised this in my book Linguistic Imperialism (OUP, 1992), quoting solid evidence that an over-reliance on English was inappropriate. Yet this is what British Council "advisers" in independent Namibia were instrumental in implementing.
British policies in Africa and Asia have aimed at strengthening English rather than promoting multilingualism, which is the social reality. Underlying British ELT have been key tenets – monolingualism, the native speaker as the ideal teacher, the earlier the better etc – which the same book diagnoses as fundamentally false. They underpin linguistic imperialism.
British goals both in the colonial period and today are primarily political and commercial. The British Council's Annual Report 2009-10 states that for the equivalent of every $1.60 of taxpayer's money it receives, it earns $4 through its English teaching and examining worldwide. ELT is of massive importance for the British economy. This underlies expansion efforts in India and China, where it has had very mixed success, except perhaps in commercial terms. David Graddol's 2010 report English Next India, commissioned by the British Council, uses similar arguments to those articulated 180 years earlier by Thomas Babington Macaulay, a senior British administrator, in making a case for British involvement in Indian education. Influence on the learning of English may be as ineffectual as in Namibia, in this very different context.
Unesco has stressed the significance of the mother tongue for over 50 years. Save the Children's 2009 report for the CfBT education trust, Language and Education: The Missing Link, hammers home this message. But why is it that an NGO and a private consortium "discover" facts that have been known in many scholarly circles for 40 years but that ELT has failed to effectively engage with?
The research evidence on mother tongue-based multilingual education is unambiguous. English-medium education in postcolonial contexts that neglects mother tongues and local cultural values is clearly inappropriate and ineffective.
There are ELT voices calling for a paradigm shift. A report for the British Council by Hywel Coleman on Pakistan points clearly in this direction. So does a 2011 book that he has edited, also for the British Council, Dreams and Realities: Developing Countries and the English Language. But if ELT professionals lead monolingual lives, or if they have no experience of becoming proficient in languages other than English, are they ever likely to understand the complexity of the learning tasks that they are committed to?
One of the intriguing aspects of globalising Anglo-American expertise is that ELT is not a high-prestige profession in either the US or the UK. In both countries there are unmet English language needs for children and adults. In addition, foreign language learning is much less widespread and effective than in many countries.
It is true that there is a massive demand for English worldwide, to which many factors, from trade and tourism to regional integration, contribute. Maintaining the value of western investments and influence in the decolonisation period led to the mushrooming of departments of Tesol and applied linguistics from the 1950s. The demand for English has been orchestrated by western governments and their allies worldwide, and key bodies such as the World Bank. The "supply" of expertise dovetails with demand.
Governments have tended to clutch at a quick fix, such as importing native speakers, or starting English ever earlier, either as a subject or as the medium of instruction, in the hope that this will make the learning of English more effective. Such demands should be challenged by ELT when both the demand and the response are unlikely to be educationally, culturally or linguistically well-informed.
Read more at http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/mar/13/linguistic-imperialism-english-language-teaching
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Topics reported on recently in Learning English give me grounds for concern about internationally driven efforts to strengthen the learning of English. They suggest strongly that TESOL/ELT is part of the problem rather than the solution. There is increasing evidence that what is on offer may in fact cause educational failure.
My worries were triggered by two shocking headlines (Learning English, 13 January). One reports on the massive failure in Namibia of English as the main medium of education: "Language policy 'poisoning' children". This was the conclusion of a recent NGO study. The second was "Language myth cripples Pakistan's schools". The myth is the belief that studying English is all you need for success in life. Policies influenced by this myth prevent most children from accessing relevant education.
I am also strongly concerned about a third story, "US launches global push to share ELT skills". The background is that in November 2011 the US state department and Tesol International Association (recently renamed) announced a partnership to meet the global demand for English and to "Work in co-ordination with US companies, universities, publishers, and other ELT stakeholders to enhance their international outreach and operations". This drive is modelled on the success of the British Council in expanding British influence worldwide. There are examples in the 17 February issue of Learning English: Tony Blair promoting British ELT in Thailand; the UK taking a "role in Ukraine primary push".
Is Anglo-American expertise really relevant in all such contexts? In fact educational "aid" worldwide does not have a strong record of success. There is scholarly evidence, for instance from Spain, that primary English is not an unmitigated success story: quite the opposite.
For Namibia a great deal of educational language planning was undertaken at the United Nations Institute for Namibia prior to independence. I summarised this in my book Linguistic Imperialism (OUP, 1992), quoting solid evidence that an over-reliance on English was inappropriate. Yet this is what British Council "advisers" in independent Namibia were instrumental in implementing.
British policies in Africa and Asia have aimed at strengthening English rather than promoting multilingualism, which is the social reality. Underlying British ELT have been key tenets – monolingualism, the native speaker as the ideal teacher, the earlier the better etc – which the same book diagnoses as fundamentally false. They underpin linguistic imperialism.
British goals both in the colonial period and today are primarily political and commercial. The British Council's Annual Report 2009-10 states that for the equivalent of every $1.60 of taxpayer's money it receives, it earns $4 through its English teaching and examining worldwide. ELT is of massive importance for the British economy. This underlies expansion efforts in India and China, where it has had very mixed success, except perhaps in commercial terms. David Graddol's 2010 report English Next India, commissioned by the British Council, uses similar arguments to those articulated 180 years earlier by Thomas Babington Macaulay, a senior British administrator, in making a case for British involvement in Indian education. Influence on the learning of English may be as ineffectual as in Namibia, in this very different context.
Unesco has stressed the significance of the mother tongue for over 50 years. Save the Children's 2009 report for the CfBT education trust, Language and Education: The Missing Link, hammers home this message. But why is it that an NGO and a private consortium "discover" facts that have been known in many scholarly circles for 40 years but that ELT has failed to effectively engage with?
The research evidence on mother tongue-based multilingual education is unambiguous. English-medium education in postcolonial contexts that neglects mother tongues and local cultural values is clearly inappropriate and ineffective.
There are ELT voices calling for a paradigm shift. A report for the British Council by Hywel Coleman on Pakistan points clearly in this direction. So does a 2011 book that he has edited, also for the British Council, Dreams and Realities: Developing Countries and the English Language. But if ELT professionals lead monolingual lives, or if they have no experience of becoming proficient in languages other than English, are they ever likely to understand the complexity of the learning tasks that they are committed to?
One of the intriguing aspects of globalising Anglo-American expertise is that ELT is not a high-prestige profession in either the US or the UK. In both countries there are unmet English language needs for children and adults. In addition, foreign language learning is much less widespread and effective than in many countries.
It is true that there is a massive demand for English worldwide, to which many factors, from trade and tourism to regional integration, contribute. Maintaining the value of western investments and influence in the decolonisation period led to the mushrooming of departments of Tesol and applied linguistics from the 1950s. The demand for English has been orchestrated by western governments and their allies worldwide, and key bodies such as the World Bank. The "supply" of expertise dovetails with demand.
Governments have tended to clutch at a quick fix, such as importing native speakers, or starting English ever earlier, either as a subject or as the medium of instruction, in the hope that this will make the learning of English more effective. Such demands should be challenged by ELT when both the demand and the response are unlikely to be educationally, culturally or linguistically well-informed.
Read more at http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/mar/13/linguistic-imperialism-english-language-teaching
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Saturday, August 4, 2012
China's Students Take on Tough Gaokao University Entrance Exam
China's Students Take on Tough Gaokao University Entrance Exam.
Every year, police road blocks are set up around schools and nearby construction sites are ordered to fall silent as the country is plunged into two days of "Gaokao fever".
This year, 9.15 million Chinese high school students are sitting the notoriously tough university entrance exam.
Critics say that for most of them, it is the culmination of a year of cramming, of repeating past papers and in large part, learning by rote.
In fact, almost everyone - students, parents, teachers and policymakers - seems to accept that the system is squeezing creativity out of students.
But despite the criticism, China's exam machine just keeps on squeezing, and more horror stories emerge each year.
Most recently, photographs emerged of a classroom in Hubei province, showing students taking energy-boosting amino acids from intravenous drips hung from the ceiling.
Miserable experience?
But is the Gaokao experience always so taxing and miserable?
The BBC followed pupils at Zhabei Number 8 High School in Shanghai for a year. The school has a population of almost 500 students, spread over three grades.
In terms of the ability of its intake, it ranks near the bottom of the 10 state-funded schools in its district.
But the first thing that strikes a visitor is that this school shows no sign of the discipline problems that might be found in schools elsewhere in the world with large cohorts of relatively disadvantaged students.
It costs the taxpayer a little more than $2,000 (£1,291) per pupil per year. The buildings are modern and smart, the pupils are well turned out in their green tracksuits, and the classes are orderly.
And, like everywhere else in China, cramming and intense exam preparation are very much in evidence.
Long hours
Ma Li, 18, fits the profile of a beleaguered final-year student toiling on the exam treadmill.
Hard working and bright, she regularly puts in an extra six hours at home at the end of a 10-hour school day.
"This studying lifestyle is pretty hard," she says. "There's not much time to relax, but we're all in it together, and we encourage each other."
Ma Li, who hopes to study shipping logistics at Shanghai Maritime University, a top-tier college, is a good illustration of an aspect of China's education system that often goes unreported.
Her parents are migrant workers who moved to Shanghai in 1993 and she has profited from the city's now three-decades-old commitment to provide universal education.
In China, it is certainly true that like so many other places, students from wealthier backgrounds get into the better schools and therefore the better universities.
But the education system appears to be better than many at acting as an effective check on the opportunity gap growing too wide.
Shanghai's recent ranking as the world leader in maths, science and reading test scores in an Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) study underlines this point.
The data was not just based on the city's elite students, but on the scores of a cross-section of students from all abilities, including the children of migrant workers.
Not stereotypical
It's not hard though to find students who are less engaged.
Ding Zhenwei is in some ways a refreshing antidote to the stereotype of China's results-obsessed student masses.
He has set his sights relatively low and plans to study interior design at a second-tier private college.
So he is coasting, confident he would make the modest Gaokao mark he needs, and is doing barely any extra studying outside of school hours.
"Even if I do fail to get in, I'll find another way of making a success of my life," he says.
In fact, 80% of Zhabei's final year students make it into either a first or second-tier university every year.
That is impressive, given the school's intake of less advantaged pupils, but it is also a sign of China's higher education boom.
In the past decade, it has massively expanded university places to reach about 30 million, the highest number in the world by far.
While that change has done nothing to reduce competition for the most prestigious institutions, it may be leading at least some students to question the value of cramming for the Gaokao.
After all, what is the point of all that pressure and stress if it leads only to a place among the ranks of the country's unemployed?
More than one million fewer students will take the exam this year compared with the peak in 2008, and observers are wondering if that fall is due to some kind of "Gaokao fatigue".
But there are still those students who see the test as important enough to have a second go.
Wang Yu, 19, is repeating her final year at Zhabei Number 8 High School because she did not get the Gaokao score she needed last time round.
"I already know the shame of failure," she says.
She is determined to do better this time so that she can rejoin her contemporaries who have started university without her.
Shining example
Education policy chiefs have long admitted the shortcomings of the Gaokao and have taken limited steps to try to introduce a more balanced and rounded education.
There is evidence in Zhabei, that students are now being trained to integrate knowledge and apply it to real-life problems.
The city's teachers are being extensively trained and there's lip service being paid to cutting those long study hours.
Shanghai was one of the first municipalities in China to stipulate a maximum amount of homework and set a minimum of one hour of physical activity a day.
How strictly those limits are being applied is another matter of course - at Zhabei, physical activity often seems to involve little more than a few minutes of choreographed group stretching exercises on the parade ground.
There is a consensus that China still leans far too much on preparation for exams and leaves too little time for real learning.
If future test takers from Zhabei Number 8 High School are really going to be given the chance to be tomorrow's creators, leaders and thinkers, then the system needs to change much faster.
If it does not, then some critics warn, that China may struggle to keep its economic boom on track.
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-18349873
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Every year, police road blocks are set up around schools and nearby construction sites are ordered to fall silent as the country is plunged into two days of "Gaokao fever".
This year, 9.15 million Chinese high school students are sitting the notoriously tough university entrance exam.
Critics say that for most of them, it is the culmination of a year of cramming, of repeating past papers and in large part, learning by rote.
In fact, almost everyone - students, parents, teachers and policymakers - seems to accept that the system is squeezing creativity out of students.
But despite the criticism, China's exam machine just keeps on squeezing, and more horror stories emerge each year.
Most recently, photographs emerged of a classroom in Hubei province, showing students taking energy-boosting amino acids from intravenous drips hung from the ceiling.
Miserable experience?
But is the Gaokao experience always so taxing and miserable?
The BBC followed pupils at Zhabei Number 8 High School in Shanghai for a year. The school has a population of almost 500 students, spread over three grades.
In terms of the ability of its intake, it ranks near the bottom of the 10 state-funded schools in its district.
But the first thing that strikes a visitor is that this school shows no sign of the discipline problems that might be found in schools elsewhere in the world with large cohorts of relatively disadvantaged students.
It costs the taxpayer a little more than $2,000 (£1,291) per pupil per year. The buildings are modern and smart, the pupils are well turned out in their green tracksuits, and the classes are orderly.
And, like everywhere else in China, cramming and intense exam preparation are very much in evidence.
Long hours
Ma Li, 18, fits the profile of a beleaguered final-year student toiling on the exam treadmill.
Hard working and bright, she regularly puts in an extra six hours at home at the end of a 10-hour school day.
"This studying lifestyle is pretty hard," she says. "There's not much time to relax, but we're all in it together, and we encourage each other."
Ma Li, who hopes to study shipping logistics at Shanghai Maritime University, a top-tier college, is a good illustration of an aspect of China's education system that often goes unreported.
Her parents are migrant workers who moved to Shanghai in 1993 and she has profited from the city's now three-decades-old commitment to provide universal education.
In China, it is certainly true that like so many other places, students from wealthier backgrounds get into the better schools and therefore the better universities.
But the education system appears to be better than many at acting as an effective check on the opportunity gap growing too wide.
Shanghai's recent ranking as the world leader in maths, science and reading test scores in an Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) study underlines this point.
The data was not just based on the city's elite students, but on the scores of a cross-section of students from all abilities, including the children of migrant workers.
Not stereotypical
It's not hard though to find students who are less engaged.
Ding Zhenwei is in some ways a refreshing antidote to the stereotype of China's results-obsessed student masses.
He has set his sights relatively low and plans to study interior design at a second-tier private college.
So he is coasting, confident he would make the modest Gaokao mark he needs, and is doing barely any extra studying outside of school hours.
"Even if I do fail to get in, I'll find another way of making a success of my life," he says.
In fact, 80% of Zhabei's final year students make it into either a first or second-tier university every year.
That is impressive, given the school's intake of less advantaged pupils, but it is also a sign of China's higher education boom.
In the past decade, it has massively expanded university places to reach about 30 million, the highest number in the world by far.
While that change has done nothing to reduce competition for the most prestigious institutions, it may be leading at least some students to question the value of cramming for the Gaokao.
After all, what is the point of all that pressure and stress if it leads only to a place among the ranks of the country's unemployed?
More than one million fewer students will take the exam this year compared with the peak in 2008, and observers are wondering if that fall is due to some kind of "Gaokao fatigue".
But there are still those students who see the test as important enough to have a second go.
Wang Yu, 19, is repeating her final year at Zhabei Number 8 High School because she did not get the Gaokao score she needed last time round.
"I already know the shame of failure," she says.
She is determined to do better this time so that she can rejoin her contemporaries who have started university without her.
Shining example
Education policy chiefs have long admitted the shortcomings of the Gaokao and have taken limited steps to try to introduce a more balanced and rounded education.
There is evidence in Zhabei, that students are now being trained to integrate knowledge and apply it to real-life problems.
The city's teachers are being extensively trained and there's lip service being paid to cutting those long study hours.
Shanghai was one of the first municipalities in China to stipulate a maximum amount of homework and set a minimum of one hour of physical activity a day.
How strictly those limits are being applied is another matter of course - at Zhabei, physical activity often seems to involve little more than a few minutes of choreographed group stretching exercises on the parade ground.
There is a consensus that China still leans far too much on preparation for exams and leaves too little time for real learning.
If future test takers from Zhabei Number 8 High School are really going to be given the chance to be tomorrow's creators, leaders and thinkers, then the system needs to change much faster.
If it does not, then some critics warn, that China may struggle to keep its economic boom on track.
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-18349873
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Thursday, August 2, 2012
End of Empire for Western Universities?
 |
| world's young graduates |
By the end of this decade, four out of every 10 of the world's young graduates are going to come from just two countries - China and India.
The projection from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) shows a far-reaching shift in the balance of graduate numbers, with the rising Asian economies accelerating ahead of the United States and western Europe.
The forecasts for the shape of the "global talent pool" in 2020 show China as rapidly expanding its graduate numbers - set to account for 29% of the world's graduates aged between 25 and 34.
The biggest faller is going to be the United States - down to 11% - and for the first time pushed into third place, behind India.
The US and the countries of the European Union combined are expected to account for little more than a quarter of young graduates.
Russia is also set to decline - its share of the world's graduates almost falling by half since the beginning of the century.
Indonesia, according to the OECD's projections, will rise into fifth place.
Degrees of change
Is this an end-of-empire moment?
Higher education has become the mirror and magnifier of economic performance - and in the post-World-War-II era, universities in the US, western Europe, Japan and Russia have dominated.
The US in particular has been the university superpower - in wealth, influence and until recently in raw numbers.
Up until 2000, the US still had a share of young graduates similar to China. And Japan had as big a proportion of young graduates as India.
Now China and India are the biggest players.
Their rise in graduate numbers reflects their changing ambitions - wanting to compete against advanced economies for high-skill, high-income employment.
Instead of offering low-cost manufacture, they are targeting the hi-tech professional jobs that have become the preserve of the Westernised middle classes.
Fivefold growth
As the OECD figures show, this is not simply a case of countries such as China expanding while others stand still.
Across the industrialised world, graduate numbers are increasing - just not as quickly as China, where they have risen fivefold in a decade.
The OECD notes that by 2020, China's young graduate population will be about the same as the total US population between the ages of 25 and 64.
This changing world map will see Brazil having a bigger share of graduates than Germany, Turkey more than Spain, Indonesia three times more than France.
The UK is bucking the trend, projected to increase its share from 3% in 2010 to 4% in 2020.
This push for more graduates has a clear economic purpose, says the OECD's analysis.
Enough jobs?
Shifting from "mass production to knowledge economy occupations" means improved employment rates and earnings - so there are "strong incentives" for countries to expand higher education.
But will there be enough graduate jobs to go round?
The OECD has tried to analyse this by looking at one aspect of the jobs market - science and technology-related occupations.
These jobs have grown rapidly - and the report suggests it is an example of how expanding higher education can generate new types of employment.
These science and technology jobs - for professionals and technicians - account for about four in every 10 jobs in some Scandinavian and northern European countries, the OECD suggests.
In contrast - and showing more of the old order - these technology jobs are only a small fraction of the workforce in China and India.
The OECD concludes that there are substantial economic benefits from investing in higher education - creating new jobs for the better-educated as unskilled manufacturing jobs disappear.
Quantity or quality?
The OECD forecast reveals the pace of growth in graduate numbers. But it does not show the quality or how this expansion will translate into economic impact.
There are other ways of mapping the changing distribution of knowledge.
A team at the University of Oxford's Internet Institute has produced a set of maps showing the "geography of the world's knowledge".
This measures how populations are consuming and producing information in the online world - mapping the level of internet use, the amount of user-generated material in Google, concentrations of academic activity and the geographical focus of Wikipedia articles.
And in contrast to the rise of the Asian economies, this tells a story of continuing Western cultural dominance.
"In raw numbers of undergraduates and PhDs, the Asian economies are racing ahead," says Prof Viktor Mayer-Schonberger, from the Oxford Internet Institute.
"But what's interesting is how the West persists in its positions of strength - because the West controls the institutions.
Mapping a new world
"There are more students in China than ever before - but they still use Western mechanisms to publish results, they accept the filters," says Prof Mayer-Schonberger.
"The big question will be whether the Chinese researchers can be as insightful as their Western counterparts - we don't know yet."
The maps also reveal how much Africa and South America are losing out in this new scramble for digital power.
Prof Mayer-Schonberger said he was "completely shocked" at the extent of the imbalance.
Another feature of the Oxford study is to show how research bases and their spin-out economic activity are clustered into relatively small areas.
In the US, says Prof Mayer-Schonberger, there is hugely disproportionate investment around Silicon Valley and the Boston area, with large tracts of "wasteland" between.
"Each era has its own distinct geography. In the information age, it's not dependent on roads or waterways, but on bases of knowledge.
"This is a new kind of industrial map. Instead of coal and steel it will be about universities and innovation."
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18646423
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Educational Detente Across Taiwan Strait
Educational Détente Across Taiwan Strait.
TAIPEI — Last January, Chao Ying, a student from northeastern China, stepped out of the train station into the rain at Jiufen, a picturesque former gold mining town in northern Taiwan, and saw something that puzzled her.
A politician from the governing Kuomintang party, who had won a legislative seat in Taiwan’s elections the day before, was standing in the back of an open van that was driving up and down the road outside the station, shouting his thanks through a loudspeaker to passers-by.
“At first I didn’t know who this might be, or what exactly he was doing,” said Ms. Chao, 25, who is studying veterinary sciences at National Chung Hsing University in Taichung, in central Taiwan. “I had to ask someone on the street.”
“I thought it was very good to see a politician thanking the people,” she said. “The Taiwanese must be very touched when they see such a thing.”
It was one more eye-opening experience for a mainland Chinese student in Taiwan. Ms. Chao is among more than 1,000 mainlanders who, for the first time, have been permitted to study for academic degrees in Taiwan and have just completed their inaugural academic year.
The government of Taiwan, the self-ruling island over which Beijing claims sovereignty, has been inching toward more amicable relations with the mainland in recent years. The full opening of the island’s universities to students from across the strait last year followed more limited academic exchange programs and the expansion of tourism and direct flights from the Chinese mainland.
The new admissions policy has been hailed as a success by universities and officials in Taiwan. Allowing young people who could eventually rise to influential positions in Communist-ruled China to immerse themselves in Taiwan society, they say, should enhance sympathy for the mainland’s democratic neighbor.
“Many Taiwanese students go to the U.S. and return very pro-American. We want to generate that same kind of effect,” said Ho Jow-fei, director general of higher education in the Ministry of Education. He added, “It is possible that some of the mainland students who come to study here may one day become political leaders.”
Taiwan also sees a partial solution to the problem of maintaining enrollments and standards as a falling birth rate shrinks the pool of applicants at home.
As for the motives of the students from mainland China, several cited an education system modeled on that of the United States that could position them well for a career abroad, but at a more reasonable cost and offered in Mandarin.
Xu Jincheng, 22, of Shanghai, who is studying engineering at Feng Chia University, said that in Taiwan he was learning to think on his feet. At his mainland university, which he did not want to identify for fear of embarrassing his former teachers, the approach was “too narrow and theoretical.”
His tutors in Taiwan, he said, push him to come up with creative solutions to real-life challenges. This was useful, he added, because “in many companies the boss expects employees to solve practical problems.”
The mainland students have grown up hearing their government’s oft-stated position that Taiwan, separately ruled since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, rightfully belongs to China and that no means, including military force, can be excluded to achieve eventual reunification.
Still, Joseph Wong, a University of Toronto political science professor, said the students were likely to return home with the message that “these two societies are unlikely to become one.”
“These mainland Chinese students tend to experience Taiwan as a fundamentally different place,” said Mr. Wong, who also teaches at Fudan University in Shanghai and says he visits Taiwan at least twice a year.
One student who has noted sharp contrasts is Zhu Haoqing, a 24-year-old from Hebei Province who is studying for a master’s degree in land management at Feng Chia University in Taichung.
Read more at https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/26/world/asia/educational-detente-across-taiwan-strait.html?ref=educationandschools
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
TAIPEI — Last January, Chao Ying, a student from northeastern China, stepped out of the train station into the rain at Jiufen, a picturesque former gold mining town in northern Taiwan, and saw something that puzzled her.
A politician from the governing Kuomintang party, who had won a legislative seat in Taiwan’s elections the day before, was standing in the back of an open van that was driving up and down the road outside the station, shouting his thanks through a loudspeaker to passers-by.
“At first I didn’t know who this might be, or what exactly he was doing,” said Ms. Chao, 25, who is studying veterinary sciences at National Chung Hsing University in Taichung, in central Taiwan. “I had to ask someone on the street.”
“I thought it was very good to see a politician thanking the people,” she said. “The Taiwanese must be very touched when they see such a thing.”
It was one more eye-opening experience for a mainland Chinese student in Taiwan. Ms. Chao is among more than 1,000 mainlanders who, for the first time, have been permitted to study for academic degrees in Taiwan and have just completed their inaugural academic year.
The government of Taiwan, the self-ruling island over which Beijing claims sovereignty, has been inching toward more amicable relations with the mainland in recent years. The full opening of the island’s universities to students from across the strait last year followed more limited academic exchange programs and the expansion of tourism and direct flights from the Chinese mainland.
The new admissions policy has been hailed as a success by universities and officials in Taiwan. Allowing young people who could eventually rise to influential positions in Communist-ruled China to immerse themselves in Taiwan society, they say, should enhance sympathy for the mainland’s democratic neighbor.
“Many Taiwanese students go to the U.S. and return very pro-American. We want to generate that same kind of effect,” said Ho Jow-fei, director general of higher education in the Ministry of Education. He added, “It is possible that some of the mainland students who come to study here may one day become political leaders.”
Taiwan also sees a partial solution to the problem of maintaining enrollments and standards as a falling birth rate shrinks the pool of applicants at home.
As for the motives of the students from mainland China, several cited an education system modeled on that of the United States that could position them well for a career abroad, but at a more reasonable cost and offered in Mandarin.
Xu Jincheng, 22, of Shanghai, who is studying engineering at Feng Chia University, said that in Taiwan he was learning to think on his feet. At his mainland university, which he did not want to identify for fear of embarrassing his former teachers, the approach was “too narrow and theoretical.”
His tutors in Taiwan, he said, push him to come up with creative solutions to real-life challenges. This was useful, he added, because “in many companies the boss expects employees to solve practical problems.”
The mainland students have grown up hearing their government’s oft-stated position that Taiwan, separately ruled since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, rightfully belongs to China and that no means, including military force, can be excluded to achieve eventual reunification.
Still, Joseph Wong, a University of Toronto political science professor, said the students were likely to return home with the message that “these two societies are unlikely to become one.”
“These mainland Chinese students tend to experience Taiwan as a fundamentally different place,” said Mr. Wong, who also teaches at Fudan University in Shanghai and says he visits Taiwan at least twice a year.
One student who has noted sharp contrasts is Zhu Haoqing, a 24-year-old from Hebei Province who is studying for a master’s degree in land management at Feng Chia University in Taichung.
Read more at https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/26/world/asia/educational-detente-across-taiwan-strait.html?ref=educationandschools
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Is China The World's Cleverest Country?
Is China The world's cleverest country?
China's results in international education tests - which have never been published - are "remarkable", says Andreas Schleicher, responsible for the highly-influential Pisa tests.
These tests, held every three years by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, measure pupils' skills in reading, numeracy and science.
Pisa tests - the Programme for International Student Assessment - have become the leading international benchmark.
The findings indicate that China has an education system that is overtaking many Western countries.
While there has been intense interest in China's economic and political development, this provides the most significant insight into how it is teaching the next generation.
'Incredible resilience'
The Pisa 2009 tests showed that Shanghai was top of the international education rankings.
But it was unclear whether Shanghai and another chart-topper, Hong Kong, were unrepresentative regional showcases.
Mr Schleicher says the unpublished results reveal that pupils in other parts of China are also performing strongly.
"Even in rural areas and in disadvantaged environments, you see a remarkable performance."
In particular, he said the test results showed the "resilience" of pupils to succeed despite tough backgrounds - and the "high levels of equity" between rich and poor pupils.
"Shanghai is an exceptional case - and the results there are close to what I expected. But what surprised me more were the results from poor provinces that came out really well. The levels of resilience are just incredible.
"In China, the idea is so deeply rooted that education is the key to mobility and success."
Investing in the future
The results for disadvantaged pupils would be the envy of any Western country, he says.
Mr Schleicher is confident of the robustness of this outline view of China's education standards.
In an attempt to get a representative picture, tests were taken in nine provinces, including poor, middle-income and wealthier regions.
The Chinese government has so far not allowed the OECD to publish the actual data.
But Mr Schleicher says the results reveal a picture of a society investing individually and collectively in education.
On a recent trip to a poor province in China, he says he saw that schools were often the most impressive buildings.
He says in the West, it is more likely to be a shopping centre.
"You get an image of a society that is investing in its future, rather than in current consumption."
There were also major cultural differences when teenagers were asked about why people succeeded at school.
"North Americans tell you typically it's all luck. 'I'm born talented in mathematics, or I'm born less talented so I'll study something else.'
"In Europe, it's all about social heritage: 'My father was a plumber so I'm going to be a plumber'.
"In China, more than nine out of 10 children tell you: 'It depends on the effort I invest and I can succeed if I study hard.'
"They take on responsibility. They can overcome obstacles and say 'I'm the owner of my own success', rather than blaming it on the system."
Education's World Cup
This year will see another round of Pisa tests - it's like World Cup year for international education. And Mr Schleicher's tips for the next fast-improving countries are Brazil, Turkey and Poland.
Mr Schleicher, a German based in the OECD's Paris headquarters, has become the godfather of such global education comparisons.
Armed with a spreadsheet and an impeccably polite manner, his opinions receive close attention in the world's education departments.
The White House responded to the last Pisa results with President Barack Obama's observation that the nation which "out-educates us today will out-compete us tomorrow".
The next round of global league tables will test 500,000 pupils in more than 70 countries - with the results to be published late next year.
Education ministers will be looking nervously at the outcome.
"In the past, politicians could always say we're doing better than last year - everyone could be a success," he says, describing the tendency for national results to rise each year.
The arrival of Pisa tests sent an icy draught through these insulated corridors.
No excuses
Perhaps the biggest discomfort of all was for Germany - where "Pisa shock" described the discovery that their much vaunted education system was distinctly average.
And the biggest change in attitude, he says, has been the United States - once with no interest in looking abroad, now enthusiastically borrowing ideas from other countries.
"Education is a field dominated by beliefs and traditions, it's inward looking. As a system you can find all kinds of excuses and explanations for not succeeding.
"The idea of Pisa was to take away all the excuses.
"People say you can only improve an education system over 25 years - but look at Poland and Singapore, which have improved in a very short time, we've seen dramatic changes."
The biggest lesson of the Pisa tests, he says, is showing there is nothing inevitable about how schools perform.
"Poverty is no longer destiny. You can see this at the level of economies, such as South Korea, Singapore."
Fair comparison?
A criticism of such rankings has been that it is unfair. How can an impoverished developing country be compared with the stockpiled multiple advantages of a wealthy Scandinavian nation?
Here Mr Schleicher makes a significant distinction. It might not be fair, but such comparisons are extremely relevant. "Relevance and fairness are not the same thing," he says.
Youngsters in the poorest countries are still competing in a global economy. "It's a terrible thing to take away the global perspective."
He also attacks the idea of accepting lower expectations for poorer children - saying this was the "big trap in the 1970s".
"It was giving the disadvantaged child an excuse - you come from a poor background, so we'll lower the horizon for you, we'll make it easier.
"But that child has still got to compete in a national labour market.
"This concept of 'fairness' is deeply unfair - because by making life easier for children from difficult circumstances, we lower their life chances."
'Sorting mechanism'
So why are the rising stars in Asia proving so successful?
Mr Schleicher says it's a philosophical difference - expecting all pupils to make the grade, rather than a "sorting mechanism" to find a chosen few.
He says anyone can create an education system where a few at the top succeed, the real challenge is to push through the entire cohort.
In China, he says this means using the best teachers in the toughest schools.
The shifting in the balance of power will be measured again with Pisa 2012, with pupils sitting tests from Stockholm to Seoul, London to Los Angeles, Ankara to Adelaide.
"I don't think of Pisa as being about ranking, it tells you what's possible. How well could we be doing?"
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17585201
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
China's results in international education tests - which have never been published - are "remarkable", says Andreas Schleicher, responsible for the highly-influential Pisa tests.
These tests, held every three years by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, measure pupils' skills in reading, numeracy and science.
Pisa tests - the Programme for International Student Assessment - have become the leading international benchmark.
The findings indicate that China has an education system that is overtaking many Western countries.
While there has been intense interest in China's economic and political development, this provides the most significant insight into how it is teaching the next generation.
'Incredible resilience'
The Pisa 2009 tests showed that Shanghai was top of the international education rankings.
But it was unclear whether Shanghai and another chart-topper, Hong Kong, were unrepresentative regional showcases.
Mr Schleicher says the unpublished results reveal that pupils in other parts of China are also performing strongly.
"Even in rural areas and in disadvantaged environments, you see a remarkable performance."
In particular, he said the test results showed the "resilience" of pupils to succeed despite tough backgrounds - and the "high levels of equity" between rich and poor pupils.
"Shanghai is an exceptional case - and the results there are close to what I expected. But what surprised me more were the results from poor provinces that came out really well. The levels of resilience are just incredible.
"In China, the idea is so deeply rooted that education is the key to mobility and success."
Investing in the future
The results for disadvantaged pupils would be the envy of any Western country, he says.
Mr Schleicher is confident of the robustness of this outline view of China's education standards.
In an attempt to get a representative picture, tests were taken in nine provinces, including poor, middle-income and wealthier regions.
The Chinese government has so far not allowed the OECD to publish the actual data.
But Mr Schleicher says the results reveal a picture of a society investing individually and collectively in education.
On a recent trip to a poor province in China, he says he saw that schools were often the most impressive buildings.
He says in the West, it is more likely to be a shopping centre.
"You get an image of a society that is investing in its future, rather than in current consumption."
There were also major cultural differences when teenagers were asked about why people succeeded at school.
"North Americans tell you typically it's all luck. 'I'm born talented in mathematics, or I'm born less talented so I'll study something else.'
"In Europe, it's all about social heritage: 'My father was a plumber so I'm going to be a plumber'.
"In China, more than nine out of 10 children tell you: 'It depends on the effort I invest and I can succeed if I study hard.'
"They take on responsibility. They can overcome obstacles and say 'I'm the owner of my own success', rather than blaming it on the system."
Education's World Cup
This year will see another round of Pisa tests - it's like World Cup year for international education. And Mr Schleicher's tips for the next fast-improving countries are Brazil, Turkey and Poland.
Mr Schleicher, a German based in the OECD's Paris headquarters, has become the godfather of such global education comparisons.
Armed with a spreadsheet and an impeccably polite manner, his opinions receive close attention in the world's education departments.
The White House responded to the last Pisa results with President Barack Obama's observation that the nation which "out-educates us today will out-compete us tomorrow".
The next round of global league tables will test 500,000 pupils in more than 70 countries - with the results to be published late next year.
Education ministers will be looking nervously at the outcome.
"In the past, politicians could always say we're doing better than last year - everyone could be a success," he says, describing the tendency for national results to rise each year.
The arrival of Pisa tests sent an icy draught through these insulated corridors.
No excuses
Perhaps the biggest discomfort of all was for Germany - where "Pisa shock" described the discovery that their much vaunted education system was distinctly average.
And the biggest change in attitude, he says, has been the United States - once with no interest in looking abroad, now enthusiastically borrowing ideas from other countries.
"Education is a field dominated by beliefs and traditions, it's inward looking. As a system you can find all kinds of excuses and explanations for not succeeding.
"The idea of Pisa was to take away all the excuses.
"People say you can only improve an education system over 25 years - but look at Poland and Singapore, which have improved in a very short time, we've seen dramatic changes."
The biggest lesson of the Pisa tests, he says, is showing there is nothing inevitable about how schools perform.
"Poverty is no longer destiny. You can see this at the level of economies, such as South Korea, Singapore."
Fair comparison?
A criticism of such rankings has been that it is unfair. How can an impoverished developing country be compared with the stockpiled multiple advantages of a wealthy Scandinavian nation?
Here Mr Schleicher makes a significant distinction. It might not be fair, but such comparisons are extremely relevant. "Relevance and fairness are not the same thing," he says.
Youngsters in the poorest countries are still competing in a global economy. "It's a terrible thing to take away the global perspective."
He also attacks the idea of accepting lower expectations for poorer children - saying this was the "big trap in the 1970s".
"It was giving the disadvantaged child an excuse - you come from a poor background, so we'll lower the horizon for you, we'll make it easier.
"But that child has still got to compete in a national labour market.
"This concept of 'fairness' is deeply unfair - because by making life easier for children from difficult circumstances, we lower their life chances."
'Sorting mechanism'
So why are the rising stars in Asia proving so successful?
Mr Schleicher says it's a philosophical difference - expecting all pupils to make the grade, rather than a "sorting mechanism" to find a chosen few.
He says anyone can create an education system where a few at the top succeed, the real challenge is to push through the entire cohort.
In China, he says this means using the best teachers in the toughest schools.
The shifting in the balance of power will be measured again with Pisa 2012, with pupils sitting tests from Stockholm to Seoul, London to Los Angeles, Ankara to Adelaide.
"I don't think of Pisa as being about ranking, it tells you what's possible. How well could we be doing?"
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17585201
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Jobs in Cambodia
Jobs in Cambodia.
Cambodia is becoming a popular destination with Western travellers because it has a stunning and diverse natural landscape, it has friendly people, it has enjoyed a rich and varied history and offers up a whole host of exciting and fantastic experiences to enjoy.
Many of those who visit Cambodia for an extended period of time fall in love with the country and its people and are determined to work to help the nation and either settle down or later return to work in Cambodia.
For people with a dream of helping the country and its citizens to progress there are various vacancies available annually for aid and charity workers as well as extensive job openings for teachers. An alternative to these industries for employment for expats is the tourism industry which is growing rapidly and bolstering the economy - this fact means that tourism is now helping to stabilise Cambodia and therefore jobs in Cambodia for Westerners can be found mainly in tourism, education or charity fields.
Anyone thinking about moving to live for a while in this fascinating and stunning country and who would like to know more specifics about the types of jobs available in Cambodia that expatriates usually take should find useful tips and insider advice in this article.
As stated tourism, charity work and education are the main employment sectors for expatriates but in recent months a significant amount of exploration has revealed extensive oil and natural gas reserves in the territorial waters of Cambodia meaning that this is an alternative field of employment that will likely open up to external Western contractors in the future.
In the meantime anyone determined to find employment in Cambodia will find it difficult to source anything remotely unless the individual in questions approaches a recruitment company specialist in either the field in which they wish to work or in the country of Cambodia itself - an alternative is to directly make contact with the aid agencies who work in Cambodia for example or international agencies which employ teaching staff for the country's schools.
In terms of teaching jobs there's one big complaint that you will hear from all those working in the education industry and that is that the level of pay is very low and consequently the standard of living that teachers can aspire to in Cambodia is correspondingly low...however you have to stop and ask yourself why you would want to teach in Cambodia in the first place - surely those who commit to teaching in schools in Phnom Penh or even in smaller towns such as Battambang aren't in it for the money!
The whole thing about working in a country like Cambodia is gaining invaluable life experience at the same time as enjoying the travel and adventure that goes hand in hand with working abroad temporarily in a country where Western expats all band together!
Teachers often find employment in one of the international schools located in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh or in one of the language schools dotted across the country, other's work alongside Khmer teachers in provincial schools mainly teaching English or teaching other key subjects through the medium of English.
For jobs in all other employment sectors there is a Khmer Website Directory which lists jobs in many diverse fields. When it comes to the better paying end of the scale of jobs available in Cambodia the charities and aid agency employees are relatively well remunerated which means that the standard of living they can enjoy is also correspondingly good. Having said that no job in Cambodia is going to make an employee particularly wealthy, in fact the main criteria that anyone who is committed to working in Cambodia should have is a desire to assist rather than to take and to facilitate development and improvement.
Read more at http://ezinearticles.com/?Jobs-in-Cambodia&id=234731
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Cambodia is becoming a popular destination with Western travellers because it has a stunning and diverse natural landscape, it has friendly people, it has enjoyed a rich and varied history and offers up a whole host of exciting and fantastic experiences to enjoy.
Many of those who visit Cambodia for an extended period of time fall in love with the country and its people and are determined to work to help the nation and either settle down or later return to work in Cambodia.
For people with a dream of helping the country and its citizens to progress there are various vacancies available annually for aid and charity workers as well as extensive job openings for teachers. An alternative to these industries for employment for expats is the tourism industry which is growing rapidly and bolstering the economy - this fact means that tourism is now helping to stabilise Cambodia and therefore jobs in Cambodia for Westerners can be found mainly in tourism, education or charity fields.
Anyone thinking about moving to live for a while in this fascinating and stunning country and who would like to know more specifics about the types of jobs available in Cambodia that expatriates usually take should find useful tips and insider advice in this article.
As stated tourism, charity work and education are the main employment sectors for expatriates but in recent months a significant amount of exploration has revealed extensive oil and natural gas reserves in the territorial waters of Cambodia meaning that this is an alternative field of employment that will likely open up to external Western contractors in the future.
In the meantime anyone determined to find employment in Cambodia will find it difficult to source anything remotely unless the individual in questions approaches a recruitment company specialist in either the field in which they wish to work or in the country of Cambodia itself - an alternative is to directly make contact with the aid agencies who work in Cambodia for example or international agencies which employ teaching staff for the country's schools.
In terms of teaching jobs there's one big complaint that you will hear from all those working in the education industry and that is that the level of pay is very low and consequently the standard of living that teachers can aspire to in Cambodia is correspondingly low...however you have to stop and ask yourself why you would want to teach in Cambodia in the first place - surely those who commit to teaching in schools in Phnom Penh or even in smaller towns such as Battambang aren't in it for the money!
The whole thing about working in a country like Cambodia is gaining invaluable life experience at the same time as enjoying the travel and adventure that goes hand in hand with working abroad temporarily in a country where Western expats all band together!
Teachers often find employment in one of the international schools located in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh or in one of the language schools dotted across the country, other's work alongside Khmer teachers in provincial schools mainly teaching English or teaching other key subjects through the medium of English.
For jobs in all other employment sectors there is a Khmer Website Directory which lists jobs in many diverse fields. When it comes to the better paying end of the scale of jobs available in Cambodia the charities and aid agency employees are relatively well remunerated which means that the standard of living they can enjoy is also correspondingly good. Having said that no job in Cambodia is going to make an employee particularly wealthy, in fact the main criteria that anyone who is committed to working in Cambodia should have is a desire to assist rather than to take and to facilitate development and improvement.
Read more at http://ezinearticles.com/?Jobs-in-Cambodia&id=234731
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
China Raises Education Spending, But More Needs to be Done
China Raises Education Spending, But More Needs to be Done.
BEIJING, March 13 (Xinhuanet) -- The central government spending on education will account for 4% of the country's GDP this year. Local financial organizations should decide their budgets accordingly, said Premier Wen Jiabao, when delivering the government report at the opening ceremony of the annual session of the National People's Congress.
The 4% is the most familiar percentage to China's educational circle. China's education has been pursuing the "4%" for about 20 years. It was a long and rough journey. If in 1993 some parents, holding their newly-born child, read the newly-printed "Reform and Development Program for China's Education" and regarded China's promise of realizing the goal of putting 4% of the GDP into education by the middle of the 1990s or the end of the 20th century as a luscious apple, then, in 2012, the child, who has graduated from high school, has ultimately picked up this luscious "apple."
According to international standards, this "apple" shows the importance of education to a country. During the mid-1980s, China's spending on education had been lower than 3% of GDP. In the late 1980s, the State Education Commission made a suggestion to the CPC Central Committee and the State Council that the percentage should be increased to 4% by the mid-1990s or 2000. However, the percentage had been lower than 3.5% till 2011.
Higher spending on education is beneficial to almost every family in China. Why did it take the country 19 years to increase education spending to 4% of GDP?
First, as the central government has taken economic development as the country's primary task, almost all local governments are thirsty for investment, and are least willing to invest in education. Due to their obsession with GDP growth and lack of transparency and supervision, education always takes the smallest share of government spending.
Second, the transfer payment for education from the fiscal revenue has met with much resistance. Although the central government has decided to increase spending on education, the reform of the country's fiscal and taxation system has been too slow, and local governments have been unwilling to spend much on education. The central government has taken a series of measures to boost local governments' enthusiasm for education, which is a gradual process.
Third, China has achieved rapid economic growth over the past 20 years, and even 4% of its GDP is a large number, making it more difficult for the country to increase education spending.
The hardship experienced by pursuing "4%" enabled us to have an insightful vision of the great resistance and difficulties in revitalizing China's education. Besides, pursuing "4%" has increasingly become the focus of media attention, demonstrating the Chinese people's great concern and deep expectations for education.
Today, the goal of "4%" is finally realized. By pushing aside all obstacles and difficulties, this government fulfilled its promise, just as Premier Wen said, "it eventually paid this debt". It is safe to say that the realization of the "4%" goal can be called a "Chang-e flying to the moon" of China's education in terms of rough courses, long period and profound significance. This fulfillment of promise not only established the government's reputation, but also enriched China's education, thus when the state is solving problems for which Chinese people have strong feelings, such as equality in access to basic educational services, rational allocation of educational resources in rural areas, and improvement of higher education quality, will be more confident and contained. After all, 4% is not a small number given China's huge GDP.
What should be reminded is that to have this "apple" invested in education fall to the ground firmly still faces intangible resistance, so the accountability mechanism should be started if necessary. What Chinese education needs most are not just money but more ideas and courage for system reforms.
It is also clear that when we are about to eat this "apple" of "4%", others have picked a greater and sweeter "apple". The investment in education of the United States had reached 7% of GDP in 1999, and the percentage had reached 5% in India in 2003. Although we are pleased about the achievement we have made, we also have to speed up cultivating the next "apple".
Read more at http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2012-03/13/c_131464418.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
BEIJING, March 13 (Xinhuanet) -- The central government spending on education will account for 4% of the country's GDP this year. Local financial organizations should decide their budgets accordingly, said Premier Wen Jiabao, when delivering the government report at the opening ceremony of the annual session of the National People's Congress.
The 4% is the most familiar percentage to China's educational circle. China's education has been pursuing the "4%" for about 20 years. It was a long and rough journey. If in 1993 some parents, holding their newly-born child, read the newly-printed "Reform and Development Program for China's Education" and regarded China's promise of realizing the goal of putting 4% of the GDP into education by the middle of the 1990s or the end of the 20th century as a luscious apple, then, in 2012, the child, who has graduated from high school, has ultimately picked up this luscious "apple."
According to international standards, this "apple" shows the importance of education to a country. During the mid-1980s, China's spending on education had been lower than 3% of GDP. In the late 1980s, the State Education Commission made a suggestion to the CPC Central Committee and the State Council that the percentage should be increased to 4% by the mid-1990s or 2000. However, the percentage had been lower than 3.5% till 2011.
Higher spending on education is beneficial to almost every family in China. Why did it take the country 19 years to increase education spending to 4% of GDP?
First, as the central government has taken economic development as the country's primary task, almost all local governments are thirsty for investment, and are least willing to invest in education. Due to their obsession with GDP growth and lack of transparency and supervision, education always takes the smallest share of government spending.
Second, the transfer payment for education from the fiscal revenue has met with much resistance. Although the central government has decided to increase spending on education, the reform of the country's fiscal and taxation system has been too slow, and local governments have been unwilling to spend much on education. The central government has taken a series of measures to boost local governments' enthusiasm for education, which is a gradual process.
Third, China has achieved rapid economic growth over the past 20 years, and even 4% of its GDP is a large number, making it more difficult for the country to increase education spending.
The hardship experienced by pursuing "4%" enabled us to have an insightful vision of the great resistance and difficulties in revitalizing China's education. Besides, pursuing "4%" has increasingly become the focus of media attention, demonstrating the Chinese people's great concern and deep expectations for education.
Today, the goal of "4%" is finally realized. By pushing aside all obstacles and difficulties, this government fulfilled its promise, just as Premier Wen said, "it eventually paid this debt". It is safe to say that the realization of the "4%" goal can be called a "Chang-e flying to the moon" of China's education in terms of rough courses, long period and profound significance. This fulfillment of promise not only established the government's reputation, but also enriched China's education, thus when the state is solving problems for which Chinese people have strong feelings, such as equality in access to basic educational services, rational allocation of educational resources in rural areas, and improvement of higher education quality, will be more confident and contained. After all, 4% is not a small number given China's huge GDP.
What should be reminded is that to have this "apple" invested in education fall to the ground firmly still faces intangible resistance, so the accountability mechanism should be started if necessary. What Chinese education needs most are not just money but more ideas and courage for system reforms.
It is also clear that when we are about to eat this "apple" of "4%", others have picked a greater and sweeter "apple". The investment in education of the United States had reached 7% of GDP in 1999, and the percentage had reached 5% in India in 2003. Although we are pleased about the achievement we have made, we also have to speed up cultivating the next "apple".
Read more at http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2012-03/13/c_131464418.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Thursday, June 21, 2012
How China is Winning the School Race
How China is Winning the School Race.
China's education performance - at least in cities such as Shanghai and Hong Kong - seems to be as spectacular as the country's breakneck economic expansion, outperforming many more advanced countries.
But what is behind this success?
Eyebrows were raised when the results of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's international maths, science and reading tests - the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) tests - were published.
Shanghai, taking part for the first time, came top in all three subjects.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong which was performing well in the last decade of British rule, has gone from good to great. In this global ranking, it came fourth in reading, second in maths and third in science.
These two Chinese cities - there was no national ranking for China - had outstripped leading education systems around the world.
The results for Beijing, not yet released, are not quite as spectacular. "But they are still high," says Andreas Schleicher, the OECD's head of education statistics and indicators.
Cheng Kai-Ming, Professor of Education at Hong Kong University, and closely involved in the Hong Kong and Shanghai tests, puts the results down to "a devotion to education not shared by some other cultures".
Competitive Exams
More than 80% of Shanghai's older secondary students attend after-school tutoring. They may spend another three to four hours each day on homework under close parental supervision.
Such diligence also reflects the ferociously competitive university entrance examinations.
"Not all Chinese parents are 'tiger mothers'," insists Prof Cheng. "But certainly they are devoted to their children's education."
Certainly both these open and outward-looking cities set great store by education, willing to adopt the best educational practices from around the world to ensure success. In Hong Kong, education accounts for more than one-fifth of entire government spending every year.
"Shanghai and Hong Kong are small education systems, virtually city states, with a concentration of ideas, manpower and resources for education," says Prof Cheng.
The innovation in these cities is not shared by other parts of China - not even Beijing, he says.
Under the banner "First class city, first class education", Shanghai set about systematically re-equipping classrooms, upgrading schools and revamping the curriculum in the last decade.
It got rid of the "key schools" system which concentrated resources only on top students and elite schools. Instead staff were trained in more interactive teaching methods and computers were brought in.
Showcase Schools
The city's schools are now a showcase for the country. About 80% of Shanghai school leavers go to university compared to an overall average of 24% in China.
Meanwhile, dynamic Hong Kong was forced into educational improvements as its industries moved to cheaper mainland Chinese areas in the 1990s. Its survival as a service and management hub for China depended on upgrading knowledge and skills.
In the last decade Hong Kong has concentrated on raising the bar and closing the gap or "lifting the floor" for all students, says a report by McKinsey management consultants.
The report, How the World's Most Improved School Systems Keep Getting Better, rated Hong Kong's education system among the best in the world.
But Hong Kong schools are undergoing another huge reform, lopping off the final year of secondary school and instead moving towards four-year university degrees from 2012 to align it with China.
Abandoning the old British model is a gamble and no-one knows how it will play out in terms of quality.
Top Teachers
However, Hong Kong believes it has laid solid, unshakeable foundations.
"In the late 1990s we moved to all-graduate [teachers]. If we want to have high achievement, subject expertise is very important for secondary schools," said Catherine KK Chan, deputy secretary for education in the Hong Kong government.
Hong Kong, like Singapore, now recruits teachers from the top 30% of the graduate cohort. By contrast, according to the OECD, the US recruits from the bottom third.
Shanghai recruits teachers more broadly. But it is already a select group.
Shanghai controls who lives and works in the city through China's notorious "houkou" or permanent residency system, allowing only the best and the brightest to become residents with access to jobs and schools.
"For over 50 years Shanghai has been accumulating talent, the cream of the cream in China. That gives it an incredible advantage," says Ruth Heyhoe, former head of the Hong Kong Institute of Education, now at the University of Toronto.
Migrant Children
The OECD's Mr Schleicher believes teacher training has played a part in Shanghai's success, with higher-performing teachers mentoring teachers from lower-performing schools, to raise standards across the board.
"What is striking about Shanghai is that there is quite a large socio-economic variability in the student population, but it does not play out in terms of its Pisa results," said Mr Schleicher.
"Some people have even suggested we did not include Shanghai's fairly large immigration population. Around 5.1% of the population are migrants from rural areas. Their children are definitely included," he said.
Last year Shanghai claimed to be the first Chinese city to provide free schooling for all migrant children. This year migrants outnumbered Shanghai-born children for the first time in state primary schools, making up 54% of the intake.
Prof Cheng agrees the Pisa results reflect a broad cross section. However the majority of migrant children are below 15 - the age at which the tests for international comparisons are taken. It is also the age of transfer to senior secondaries.
"If they were allowed to attend senior secondary schools in the city, the results would be very different," said Prof Cheng.
Even now "to some extent, where people are born largely determines their chances of educational success", said Gu Jun, a professor of sociology at Shanghai university.
Their societies are changing rapidly and for both Shanghai and Hong Kong, being top might prove to be easier than staying there.
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14812822
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
China's education performance - at least in cities such as Shanghai and Hong Kong - seems to be as spectacular as the country's breakneck economic expansion, outperforming many more advanced countries.
But what is behind this success?
Eyebrows were raised when the results of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's international maths, science and reading tests - the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) tests - were published.
Shanghai, taking part for the first time, came top in all three subjects.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong which was performing well in the last decade of British rule, has gone from good to great. In this global ranking, it came fourth in reading, second in maths and third in science.
These two Chinese cities - there was no national ranking for China - had outstripped leading education systems around the world.
The results for Beijing, not yet released, are not quite as spectacular. "But they are still high," says Andreas Schleicher, the OECD's head of education statistics and indicators.
Cheng Kai-Ming, Professor of Education at Hong Kong University, and closely involved in the Hong Kong and Shanghai tests, puts the results down to "a devotion to education not shared by some other cultures".
Competitive Exams
More than 80% of Shanghai's older secondary students attend after-school tutoring. They may spend another three to four hours each day on homework under close parental supervision.
Such diligence also reflects the ferociously competitive university entrance examinations.
"Not all Chinese parents are 'tiger mothers'," insists Prof Cheng. "But certainly they are devoted to their children's education."
Certainly both these open and outward-looking cities set great store by education, willing to adopt the best educational practices from around the world to ensure success. In Hong Kong, education accounts for more than one-fifth of entire government spending every year.
"Shanghai and Hong Kong are small education systems, virtually city states, with a concentration of ideas, manpower and resources for education," says Prof Cheng.
The innovation in these cities is not shared by other parts of China - not even Beijing, he says.
Under the banner "First class city, first class education", Shanghai set about systematically re-equipping classrooms, upgrading schools and revamping the curriculum in the last decade.
It got rid of the "key schools" system which concentrated resources only on top students and elite schools. Instead staff were trained in more interactive teaching methods and computers were brought in.
Showcase Schools
The city's schools are now a showcase for the country. About 80% of Shanghai school leavers go to university compared to an overall average of 24% in China.
Meanwhile, dynamic Hong Kong was forced into educational improvements as its industries moved to cheaper mainland Chinese areas in the 1990s. Its survival as a service and management hub for China depended on upgrading knowledge and skills.
In the last decade Hong Kong has concentrated on raising the bar and closing the gap or "lifting the floor" for all students, says a report by McKinsey management consultants.
The report, How the World's Most Improved School Systems Keep Getting Better, rated Hong Kong's education system among the best in the world.
But Hong Kong schools are undergoing another huge reform, lopping off the final year of secondary school and instead moving towards four-year university degrees from 2012 to align it with China.
Abandoning the old British model is a gamble and no-one knows how it will play out in terms of quality.
Top Teachers
However, Hong Kong believes it has laid solid, unshakeable foundations.
"In the late 1990s we moved to all-graduate [teachers]. If we want to have high achievement, subject expertise is very important for secondary schools," said Catherine KK Chan, deputy secretary for education in the Hong Kong government.
Hong Kong, like Singapore, now recruits teachers from the top 30% of the graduate cohort. By contrast, according to the OECD, the US recruits from the bottom third.
Shanghai recruits teachers more broadly. But it is already a select group.
Shanghai controls who lives and works in the city through China's notorious "houkou" or permanent residency system, allowing only the best and the brightest to become residents with access to jobs and schools.
"For over 50 years Shanghai has been accumulating talent, the cream of the cream in China. That gives it an incredible advantage," says Ruth Heyhoe, former head of the Hong Kong Institute of Education, now at the University of Toronto.
Migrant Children
The OECD's Mr Schleicher believes teacher training has played a part in Shanghai's success, with higher-performing teachers mentoring teachers from lower-performing schools, to raise standards across the board.
"What is striking about Shanghai is that there is quite a large socio-economic variability in the student population, but it does not play out in terms of its Pisa results," said Mr Schleicher.
"Some people have even suggested we did not include Shanghai's fairly large immigration population. Around 5.1% of the population are migrants from rural areas. Their children are definitely included," he said.
Last year Shanghai claimed to be the first Chinese city to provide free schooling for all migrant children. This year migrants outnumbered Shanghai-born children for the first time in state primary schools, making up 54% of the intake.
Prof Cheng agrees the Pisa results reflect a broad cross section. However the majority of migrant children are below 15 - the age at which the tests for international comparisons are taken. It is also the age of transfer to senior secondaries.
"If they were allowed to attend senior secondary schools in the city, the results would be very different," said Prof Cheng.
Even now "to some extent, where people are born largely determines their chances of educational success", said Gu Jun, a professor of sociology at Shanghai university.
Their societies are changing rapidly and for both Shanghai and Hong Kong, being top might prove to be easier than staying there.
Read more at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14812822
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Friday, May 25, 2012
Education a Priority for Vietnam’s Youth
Education a Priority for Vietnam’s Youth.
Hanoi (Asia News) – Education for young Vietnamese is getting worse. A survey among high school students in Ho Chi Minh City shows that 32.2 per cent are disrespectful towards teachers, 38.8 per cent uses foul language often and 53.6 per cent does it sometimes.
Another survey indicates that from 2005 to the present the number of students involved in antisocial behaviour increased in both frequency and gravity. The rise in sexual abuse is another aspect of the broader moral decline among young people.
In 2011 alone, 1386 minors were sexually abused by adults, that is 11.8 per cent more than in 2010. Of these, 51 were killed, 427 raped, 495 forced to have intercourse with adults and 128 intentionally injured. Many children and teenagers have also become the victims of human trafficking through the border with China, Thailand and Cambodia.
AsiaNews spoke with Prof Hoàng Tuy, 84, who recently won the first Constantin Caratheodory Prize established by the International Society of Global Optimisation. He is very concerned about the state of education in Vietnam.
“Education is an urgent matter. Our life increasingly needs an overall reform of education if we do not want our country to remain backward . . . . Shortcomings in and harm to education have accumulated and reached an extreme level. We can no longer tolerate them. Now a total overhaul of education is the first order of business. Reality requires us to change the current state of education.”
When the educational level of a country reaches such a low level, it becomes imperative for society to wake up, the professor said, from ordinary citizens to its leaders.
“An enlightened education must begin with a true democratic spirit and determination to build a clean, just and civilised society, and train its leadership in view of this,” he said. “Today, the moral decline and unlawful behaviour by young people should alarm families, schools and universities. The sense of morality among young generations is going down.”
A decline in academic ethics as well as lying and dishonesty among public officials are among the reasons for this trend, the scholar noted. They affect young people in particular. On the other hand, university education appears to be the key to ensure an overall higher quality education, but for decades, policies in this area have been inadequate, touching the lives of millions of students.
“Education must be at the top of the nation’s priority list. The role of education is important and affects the country’s survival. It is the foundation of society and helps maintain and develop values.”
It is a social good and as such, “the government should create the conditions that allow religions and the Vietnamese people to participate in the education of younger generations. We need a healthy social environment free of corruption, respectful of human dignity, freedom of religion and human rights for all.”
Read more at http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Education,-a-priority-for-Vietnam%E2%80%99s-youth-23813.html
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Hanoi (Asia News) – Education for young Vietnamese is getting worse. A survey among high school students in Ho Chi Minh City shows that 32.2 per cent are disrespectful towards teachers, 38.8 per cent uses foul language often and 53.6 per cent does it sometimes.
Another survey indicates that from 2005 to the present the number of students involved in antisocial behaviour increased in both frequency and gravity. The rise in sexual abuse is another aspect of the broader moral decline among young people.
In 2011 alone, 1386 minors were sexually abused by adults, that is 11.8 per cent more than in 2010. Of these, 51 were killed, 427 raped, 495 forced to have intercourse with adults and 128 intentionally injured. Many children and teenagers have also become the victims of human trafficking through the border with China, Thailand and Cambodia.
AsiaNews spoke with Prof Hoàng Tuy, 84, who recently won the first Constantin Caratheodory Prize established by the International Society of Global Optimisation. He is very concerned about the state of education in Vietnam.
“Education is an urgent matter. Our life increasingly needs an overall reform of education if we do not want our country to remain backward . . . . Shortcomings in and harm to education have accumulated and reached an extreme level. We can no longer tolerate them. Now a total overhaul of education is the first order of business. Reality requires us to change the current state of education.”
When the educational level of a country reaches such a low level, it becomes imperative for society to wake up, the professor said, from ordinary citizens to its leaders.
“An enlightened education must begin with a true democratic spirit and determination to build a clean, just and civilised society, and train its leadership in view of this,” he said. “Today, the moral decline and unlawful behaviour by young people should alarm families, schools and universities. The sense of morality among young generations is going down.”
A decline in academic ethics as well as lying and dishonesty among public officials are among the reasons for this trend, the scholar noted. They affect young people in particular. On the other hand, university education appears to be the key to ensure an overall higher quality education, but for decades, policies in this area have been inadequate, touching the lives of millions of students.
“Education must be at the top of the nation’s priority list. The role of education is important and affects the country’s survival. It is the foundation of society and helps maintain and develop values.”
It is a social good and as such, “the government should create the conditions that allow religions and the Vietnamese people to participate in the education of younger generations. We need a healthy social environment free of corruption, respectful of human dignity, freedom of religion and human rights for all.”
Read more at http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Education,-a-priority-for-Vietnam%E2%80%99s-youth-23813.html
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Monday, April 30, 2012
Culture Shock For A Westerner Living in China
Culture Shock For A Westerner Living in China.
I first came to China in 2005. I flew in via Hong Kong to Shenzhen and was completely blown away by this city. I didn't know quite what to expect but it certainly exceeded any expectations I might have had. Thirty years ago Shenzhen was just a small fishing village across the river from Hong Kong but with an idea of creating a model city to rival Hong Kong, the then leader Deng Xiaoping set out his vision for this super-city. In my opinion Shenzhen is an amazing modern city with futurist tall buildings, well designed family friendly apartment blocks, wide tree lined avenues, lush vegetation, relaxing parks and a vibrant economy to compete with any western city. Wow! I thought - this is communist China!
It wasn't however until 2007 when I came to live in Zunyi, a 'small' city in Guizhou province did I come to discover the real China. The fact is you never really know a country until you live there and for me, it was a real culture shock! Make no mistake about it, life in the west is so very different from life in China.
Population: As we all know, China has a huge population - 1.3 billion people, a figure which is difficult to comprehend. Zunyi is considered to be a small city in China but has a population bigger than England's second biggest city - Birmingham. And because everyone lives in apartment blocks, the inhabitants are more crammed in than English cities. Only the mountain right in the middle of the Zunyi creates a refuge from the noise and busyness of the city but most cities here don't have mountains in the middle of them. The bigger cities like Shanghai, Beijing and Chongqing seem to places of endless habitation but fortunately the city planners have thought about this and there are always either beautiful parks or historic sites to escape too. Because of the size of the population it is difficult to get away from people in China; even the countryside where agriculture is labour intensive, it can be difficult to be totally alone. Having said that, I have been fortunate enough to be taken to some stunning countryside away from the city where all you can hear is the birdsong and only occasionally meet another person.
Cultural differences: It is quite difficult to define Chinese culture so simply because like western culture, it is changing. There is the old traditional culture which underpins society and there is the new modern culture imported from the West, Japan and Korea. Although China has one of the oldest civilisations, it is actually one of the newest countries. Sixty years ago was the Cultural Revolution lead by Mao Zedong which swept away thousands of years of dynastic rule by emperors and freed the great majority of people from impoverished living. China reinvented itself in 1949 and became a truly communist country but that was sixty years ago and there can be no comparison between now and then. Only long held traditions and values remain and some of these are under threat from modern day life. Today young people in the cities have high aspirations and want all the modern day fashion and technology they can get their hands on.
So, on the surface in the modern cities all can appear the same as in the West. The men and women wear the same stylish clothes, the girls wear skimpy clothes to reveal their figure and the boys wear fashion to imitate their pop idols; business people drive expensive saloons and 4 x 4s (often black) and high-heeled ladies shop in expensive boutiques. Look up at the skyline and you'll see amazing high rise blocks of futuristic design which equal or even better western skylines. Under the modern exterior however, most people are very traditional and it is best to be aware of these traditional values if you want to live, work and do business here.
Family: In China, the family unit is a very strong one and there is generally great respect afforded by children to parents and to grandparents. That doesn't mean that everything is perfect in family life but family is the refuge and the security here. When people need help they turn to family, if they need financial backing for a business venture they turn to family and if they need advice, they do the same. It is not only in life that respect is given but in death also. Every year in April there is ceremony called Tomb Sweeping Day and on this day families will visit the graves of their relatives to clean the graves, say prayers and burn paper money for the dead. This creates a strong connection between the living and their ancestors, and gives an underlying message to the living that they won't be forgotten, even in death.
Today in China there is still the one child policy, although this does not apply in the countryside where there is a need for labour. This means that the family is small and often the children are cosseted. Most often both parents will go out to work and therefore the grandparents are frequently called upon to assist with the child's care. Sometimes the child will live with the grandparents if the father and mother have to work away. Many people have to work in other cities and commuting is impossible and so can only visit their family once or twice a year. This makes festivals like Spring Festival so important to the family. At Spring Festival most workers get a week's holiday and this is a big time for family reunions. This can be the only real holiday a lot of people get in the year.
Marriage: In China, marriage is still considered the only way for a couple to live together and there is strong pressure for young people to get married before they are 30, especially for the girls. The idea of a woman seeking a career above marriage is almost unheard of and equally of not wanting children. If a woman doesn't want children, she will be considered to be not normal. A lot of young people have an idealised view of marriage despite the divorce rate being high here; they always believe they can make the successful marriage. What's more there is still a notion for a lot of young women that they should be virgins when they get married, although this idea doesn't really hold in the big cities. Also, a lot of men want to marry virgins, especially in the countryside where old attitudes prevail and it is sometimes expected for a girl to produce a certificate from a doctor to say she is a virgin.
Youth culture: Young people now wear the latest fashion from Japan, Korea and the West but this can give the wrong impression as to their attitudes about love and sex which are still old fashioned. They may look like any young person from a permissive western society but they don't sleep around, they don't expect to have sex by the time they are eighteen and they wouldn't dare to bring a baby into the world without being married; what's more they're not into drugs either. High school students are discouraged by their parents from forming relationships until after they have graduated at the age of eighteen. Young girls may look stunning in the tight clothes and ultra short skirts but unlike many of their western counterparts, they are not party animals and don't go out on the town to get drunk; in fact a lot of them don't even drink alcohol at all and they certainly don't expect to be chatted up by strangers. Yes, attitudes are more westernised in the big cities but there is still a strong recognition of what it is to be Chinese and young people are very proud of this. The Chinese people are conservative by nature and this should be understood by western visitors, so as not to offend.
Work: There is a very strong work ethic in China and people are not afraid of work here. The fact is that if people don't work, they get no support from the state, not that they would expect it. Most people will do any work to earn a little money and don't feel a sense of shame if they have menial jobs. It is quite quite humbling to see the types of work that people will do to earn a small amount of money. People here take a great sense of pride in having a secure job and will do nothing to threaten that security. This can mean that some employees are exploited by their bosses who know their staff will not cause trouble if there are difficulties at work. Another fact is that there are too many workers for the jobs available and so people are always grateful to have work. Chinese people will work long hours doing the most tedious jobs without complaint but of course many do aspire to better themselves but competition for jobs is great and the greatest fear for a student at school or college is not to have a job after graduation. This is why students are prepared to begin their school day at 7 a.m. and finish their last class at 9.30 p.m. and will go to school on Saturday and then attend private classes on Sunday with little complaint. They get tired and worried about the never ending round of exams but they do it because they want to work and not just want work but want to have a good job. Many students today aspire to being rich and why shouldn't they, when their country is heading towards becoming the strongest economy in the world.
National pride: Chinese people are immensely proud of their country and their country's achievements and this was strongly reinforced during the 2008 Olympic Games and the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan when the entire country rallied to help the stricken area and its people. China is made up of many ethnic groups, each with their own traditions and dialect but is united under one flag and one leadership. There has been descent in some parts but on the whole, the country is as one. The Chinese people also have very strong feelings about Tibet and also Taiwan and I suggest that until you research the history about these areas, you don't get into a debate with Chinese people about them. There has been a lot of misinformation spread around about these, especially about Tibet by people who don't fully understand the history of China. It is a good idea to read some good books about China's history before coming to live in China; it will help you understand its people.
Manners: This may be one of the most difficult things to come to terms with in China because the Chinese people don't adopt the same manners as we are used to in the UK or US. It has sometimes been my opinion that Chinese people don't have manners at all but this is an over generalisation. Chinese people don't like to queue or wait to be served; if you are in shop being served, expect someone to barge in front of you but of course you don't have to put up with it. You have to learn to be quick and in some cases assert your ground. Also if you are in conversation with another, don't expect people to wait until you have finished your conversation before another will charge right on in to say their point. This will be much more so in the smaller cities where people have not become so educated and not so 'westernised.'
The thing to remember is that this is their way and there is little point in trying to change it because you won't. I believe however that you should maintain your own manners and civility but not try to thrust your beliefs onto others. When I first came to China, I found that no one ever smiled at me and no shop keeper ever thanked me for my custom. I thought the Chinese to be a very cold race but once I got to know people, I found them to be very warm, friendly and generous, even if they have little to give. My suggestion is that you smile first and let people know that you are friendly toward them, and that way they will soon begin to respond to you. The Chinese people in general are shy people and this explains a lot of their reticence to smile.
Big city, small city: If you live in one of the major cities like Shanghai or Beijing you will pretty much be invisible as you go about your daily business but if you choose to live in a smaller city or even a town, you will be source of much interest. In Zunyi I am one of a dozen or so foreigners and so I am often starred at and always in demand by students to talk English with me. I get lots of invites out to have a meal or go on trips; it certainly compensates for the isolation I have often felt. And while on the subject of being invited out for a meal. It is customary for the person doing the inviting to do the paying, so don't be concerned about others paying for you but out of politeness, you should return the invite and pay for them.
There times when you can feel completely frustrated by living in China, with the constant noise and smells, the apparent rudeness and disregard for others; it can really get to you but you have to accept it and try not to get angry. Chinese are far more tolerant in this respect; they have to be more tolerant of each other because there are so many people living in such close proximity to each other here. They are not fazed by air-horns, motorcycles on the footpath and people pushing in or cars cutting them up. It is important to remember that you are the foreigner here and this is not your country.
If you want to come and work here, I suggest you embrace the differences and don't try to resist them. I have gained so many friends here in China and it will be a very sad day when I finally return to the U.K. At times China has driven me mad with frustration but on the other hand, China has given me so much.
Read more at http://ezinearticles.com/?Culture-Shock---A-Westerner-Living-in-China&id=4240261
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
I first came to China in 2005. I flew in via Hong Kong to Shenzhen and was completely blown away by this city. I didn't know quite what to expect but it certainly exceeded any expectations I might have had. Thirty years ago Shenzhen was just a small fishing village across the river from Hong Kong but with an idea of creating a model city to rival Hong Kong, the then leader Deng Xiaoping set out his vision for this super-city. In my opinion Shenzhen is an amazing modern city with futurist tall buildings, well designed family friendly apartment blocks, wide tree lined avenues, lush vegetation, relaxing parks and a vibrant economy to compete with any western city. Wow! I thought - this is communist China!
It wasn't however until 2007 when I came to live in Zunyi, a 'small' city in Guizhou province did I come to discover the real China. The fact is you never really know a country until you live there and for me, it was a real culture shock! Make no mistake about it, life in the west is so very different from life in China.
Population: As we all know, China has a huge population - 1.3 billion people, a figure which is difficult to comprehend. Zunyi is considered to be a small city in China but has a population bigger than England's second biggest city - Birmingham. And because everyone lives in apartment blocks, the inhabitants are more crammed in than English cities. Only the mountain right in the middle of the Zunyi creates a refuge from the noise and busyness of the city but most cities here don't have mountains in the middle of them. The bigger cities like Shanghai, Beijing and Chongqing seem to places of endless habitation but fortunately the city planners have thought about this and there are always either beautiful parks or historic sites to escape too. Because of the size of the population it is difficult to get away from people in China; even the countryside where agriculture is labour intensive, it can be difficult to be totally alone. Having said that, I have been fortunate enough to be taken to some stunning countryside away from the city where all you can hear is the birdsong and only occasionally meet another person.
Cultural differences: It is quite difficult to define Chinese culture so simply because like western culture, it is changing. There is the old traditional culture which underpins society and there is the new modern culture imported from the West, Japan and Korea. Although China has one of the oldest civilisations, it is actually one of the newest countries. Sixty years ago was the Cultural Revolution lead by Mao Zedong which swept away thousands of years of dynastic rule by emperors and freed the great majority of people from impoverished living. China reinvented itself in 1949 and became a truly communist country but that was sixty years ago and there can be no comparison between now and then. Only long held traditions and values remain and some of these are under threat from modern day life. Today young people in the cities have high aspirations and want all the modern day fashion and technology they can get their hands on.
So, on the surface in the modern cities all can appear the same as in the West. The men and women wear the same stylish clothes, the girls wear skimpy clothes to reveal their figure and the boys wear fashion to imitate their pop idols; business people drive expensive saloons and 4 x 4s (often black) and high-heeled ladies shop in expensive boutiques. Look up at the skyline and you'll see amazing high rise blocks of futuristic design which equal or even better western skylines. Under the modern exterior however, most people are very traditional and it is best to be aware of these traditional values if you want to live, work and do business here.
Family: In China, the family unit is a very strong one and there is generally great respect afforded by children to parents and to grandparents. That doesn't mean that everything is perfect in family life but family is the refuge and the security here. When people need help they turn to family, if they need financial backing for a business venture they turn to family and if they need advice, they do the same. It is not only in life that respect is given but in death also. Every year in April there is ceremony called Tomb Sweeping Day and on this day families will visit the graves of their relatives to clean the graves, say prayers and burn paper money for the dead. This creates a strong connection between the living and their ancestors, and gives an underlying message to the living that they won't be forgotten, even in death.
Today in China there is still the one child policy, although this does not apply in the countryside where there is a need for labour. This means that the family is small and often the children are cosseted. Most often both parents will go out to work and therefore the grandparents are frequently called upon to assist with the child's care. Sometimes the child will live with the grandparents if the father and mother have to work away. Many people have to work in other cities and commuting is impossible and so can only visit their family once or twice a year. This makes festivals like Spring Festival so important to the family. At Spring Festival most workers get a week's holiday and this is a big time for family reunions. This can be the only real holiday a lot of people get in the year.
Marriage: In China, marriage is still considered the only way for a couple to live together and there is strong pressure for young people to get married before they are 30, especially for the girls. The idea of a woman seeking a career above marriage is almost unheard of and equally of not wanting children. If a woman doesn't want children, she will be considered to be not normal. A lot of young people have an idealised view of marriage despite the divorce rate being high here; they always believe they can make the successful marriage. What's more there is still a notion for a lot of young women that they should be virgins when they get married, although this idea doesn't really hold in the big cities. Also, a lot of men want to marry virgins, especially in the countryside where old attitudes prevail and it is sometimes expected for a girl to produce a certificate from a doctor to say she is a virgin.
Youth culture: Young people now wear the latest fashion from Japan, Korea and the West but this can give the wrong impression as to their attitudes about love and sex which are still old fashioned. They may look like any young person from a permissive western society but they don't sleep around, they don't expect to have sex by the time they are eighteen and they wouldn't dare to bring a baby into the world without being married; what's more they're not into drugs either. High school students are discouraged by their parents from forming relationships until after they have graduated at the age of eighteen. Young girls may look stunning in the tight clothes and ultra short skirts but unlike many of their western counterparts, they are not party animals and don't go out on the town to get drunk; in fact a lot of them don't even drink alcohol at all and they certainly don't expect to be chatted up by strangers. Yes, attitudes are more westernised in the big cities but there is still a strong recognition of what it is to be Chinese and young people are very proud of this. The Chinese people are conservative by nature and this should be understood by western visitors, so as not to offend.
Work: There is a very strong work ethic in China and people are not afraid of work here. The fact is that if people don't work, they get no support from the state, not that they would expect it. Most people will do any work to earn a little money and don't feel a sense of shame if they have menial jobs. It is quite quite humbling to see the types of work that people will do to earn a small amount of money. People here take a great sense of pride in having a secure job and will do nothing to threaten that security. This can mean that some employees are exploited by their bosses who know their staff will not cause trouble if there are difficulties at work. Another fact is that there are too many workers for the jobs available and so people are always grateful to have work. Chinese people will work long hours doing the most tedious jobs without complaint but of course many do aspire to better themselves but competition for jobs is great and the greatest fear for a student at school or college is not to have a job after graduation. This is why students are prepared to begin their school day at 7 a.m. and finish their last class at 9.30 p.m. and will go to school on Saturday and then attend private classes on Sunday with little complaint. They get tired and worried about the never ending round of exams but they do it because they want to work and not just want work but want to have a good job. Many students today aspire to being rich and why shouldn't they, when their country is heading towards becoming the strongest economy in the world.
National pride: Chinese people are immensely proud of their country and their country's achievements and this was strongly reinforced during the 2008 Olympic Games and the 2008 earthquake in Sichuan when the entire country rallied to help the stricken area and its people. China is made up of many ethnic groups, each with their own traditions and dialect but is united under one flag and one leadership. There has been descent in some parts but on the whole, the country is as one. The Chinese people also have very strong feelings about Tibet and also Taiwan and I suggest that until you research the history about these areas, you don't get into a debate with Chinese people about them. There has been a lot of misinformation spread around about these, especially about Tibet by people who don't fully understand the history of China. It is a good idea to read some good books about China's history before coming to live in China; it will help you understand its people.
Manners: This may be one of the most difficult things to come to terms with in China because the Chinese people don't adopt the same manners as we are used to in the UK or US. It has sometimes been my opinion that Chinese people don't have manners at all but this is an over generalisation. Chinese people don't like to queue or wait to be served; if you are in shop being served, expect someone to barge in front of you but of course you don't have to put up with it. You have to learn to be quick and in some cases assert your ground. Also if you are in conversation with another, don't expect people to wait until you have finished your conversation before another will charge right on in to say their point. This will be much more so in the smaller cities where people have not become so educated and not so 'westernised.'
The thing to remember is that this is their way and there is little point in trying to change it because you won't. I believe however that you should maintain your own manners and civility but not try to thrust your beliefs onto others. When I first came to China, I found that no one ever smiled at me and no shop keeper ever thanked me for my custom. I thought the Chinese to be a very cold race but once I got to know people, I found them to be very warm, friendly and generous, even if they have little to give. My suggestion is that you smile first and let people know that you are friendly toward them, and that way they will soon begin to respond to you. The Chinese people in general are shy people and this explains a lot of their reticence to smile.
Big city, small city: If you live in one of the major cities like Shanghai or Beijing you will pretty much be invisible as you go about your daily business but if you choose to live in a smaller city or even a town, you will be source of much interest. In Zunyi I am one of a dozen or so foreigners and so I am often starred at and always in demand by students to talk English with me. I get lots of invites out to have a meal or go on trips; it certainly compensates for the isolation I have often felt. And while on the subject of being invited out for a meal. It is customary for the person doing the inviting to do the paying, so don't be concerned about others paying for you but out of politeness, you should return the invite and pay for them.
There times when you can feel completely frustrated by living in China, with the constant noise and smells, the apparent rudeness and disregard for others; it can really get to you but you have to accept it and try not to get angry. Chinese are far more tolerant in this respect; they have to be more tolerant of each other because there are so many people living in such close proximity to each other here. They are not fazed by air-horns, motorcycles on the footpath and people pushing in or cars cutting them up. It is important to remember that you are the foreigner here and this is not your country.
If you want to come and work here, I suggest you embrace the differences and don't try to resist them. I have gained so many friends here in China and it will be a very sad day when I finally return to the U.K. At times China has driven me mad with frustration but on the other hand, China has given me so much.
Read more at http://ezinearticles.com/?Culture-Shock---A-Westerner-Living-in-China&id=4240261
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Friday, April 27, 2012
Advices for Foreigners Working in China
Advices for Foreigners Working in China.
China now attracts millions of people from all over the world. The experience of working in China will be memorable. But are you clear about the China work situation, the type of job, the workplace and the salary? The following will give a detailed information of them.
China now attracts millions of people from all over the world. The experience of working in China will be memorable. But are you clear about the China work situation, the type of job, the workplace and the salary? The following will give a detailed information of them.
Type of Job for Foreigners in China
Currently, most foreigners in demand in China are English teachers, and these offers are mostly provided by schools. Schools are classified into public schools and private schools. A few private schools promise a high salary in advertisements, however, after having worked there you may find out that a few private schools couldn't arrange a Z or F visa for you to work in China, and it would be difficult to get the entire salary they promised before, for reasons that they don't take in enough students or the quality of you classes is not good enough. And of course, it is illegal to wok in China without a Z or F visa, while in public school, there is a Foreign Affairs Office that will assist you in your work and daily life, provide better accomodation for foreign experts, and the salary is paid entirely according to the contract.
City to Work for Foreigners in China
It seems that most foreigners are only familiar with several big cities in China, like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and focus on jobs in these cities. As a result, there are more applicants and competition there, which leads to a relatively lower salary because of the much higher living cost than that in other cities.
Salary for Foreigners in China
It seems that most foreigners are only familiar with several big cities in China, like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and focus on jobs in these cities. As a result, there are more applicants and competition there, which leads to a relatively lower salary because of the much higher living cost than that in other cities.
If you don't have any special reasons to work in big cities, it would be a better choice to work in a relatively smaller city, where the salary is almost the same as that in big cities but the living cost is much lower, and what's more, the scenery is usually more beautiful and the local people are more friendly.
Time of Job Hunting in China
Compared with other positions, foreign teacher is a little bit special. The best time to find teaching work in China is in September, when the schools return, or in February, just after the winter holiday, although there are thousands of short summer school placements from June to September. And meanwhile, other positions have no special requirement.
Read more at http://news.at0086.com/Consulting-jobs/Top-4-Advices-for-Foreigners-Working-in-China.html
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
China now attracts millions of people from all over the world. The experience of working in China will be memorable. But are you clear about the China work situation, the type of job, the workplace and the salary? The following will give a detailed information of them.
China now attracts millions of people from all over the world. The experience of working in China will be memorable. But are you clear about the China work situation, the type of job, the workplace and the salary? The following will give a detailed information of them.
Type of Job for Foreigners in China
Currently, most foreigners in demand in China are English teachers, and these offers are mostly provided by schools. Schools are classified into public schools and private schools. A few private schools promise a high salary in advertisements, however, after having worked there you may find out that a few private schools couldn't arrange a Z or F visa for you to work in China, and it would be difficult to get the entire salary they promised before, for reasons that they don't take in enough students or the quality of you classes is not good enough. And of course, it is illegal to wok in China without a Z or F visa, while in public school, there is a Foreign Affairs Office that will assist you in your work and daily life, provide better accomodation for foreign experts, and the salary is paid entirely according to the contract.
City to Work for Foreigners in China
It seems that most foreigners are only familiar with several big cities in China, like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and focus on jobs in these cities. As a result, there are more applicants and competition there, which leads to a relatively lower salary because of the much higher living cost than that in other cities.
Salary for Foreigners in China
It seems that most foreigners are only familiar with several big cities in China, like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and focus on jobs in these cities. As a result, there are more applicants and competition there, which leads to a relatively lower salary because of the much higher living cost than that in other cities.
If you don't have any special reasons to work in big cities, it would be a better choice to work in a relatively smaller city, where the salary is almost the same as that in big cities but the living cost is much lower, and what's more, the scenery is usually more beautiful and the local people are more friendly.
Time of Job Hunting in China
Compared with other positions, foreign teacher is a little bit special. The best time to find teaching work in China is in September, when the schools return, or in February, just after the winter holiday, although there are thousands of short summer school placements from June to September. And meanwhile, other positions have no special requirement.
Read more at http://news.at0086.com/Consulting-jobs/Top-4-Advices-for-Foreigners-Working-in-China.html
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Why Foreigners Stay in China
Why Foreigners Stay in China?
"IT was Beijing's wealth of opportunity that made me want to come here to work," says Mao Yihui, a bespectacled, round-faced, close-cropped Italian, fluent in Chinese. Mao currently works as English editor on a website in Beijing. He loves music, and in his spare time gets together with five friends from Australia, Canada and Italy to play in the band they have formed, "Big Aeroplane," in which he is drummer. They mainly perform in Sanlitun bars, and are sometimes invited to play at embassies. To him, life in Beijing becomes daily more colorful. He says, "The development of bands here is closely related to the diversity of performance venues. As regards progressive music, Italy lags far behind China."
Alain, from France, became fascinated by Chinese culture on his first sight of Chinese calligraphy. He left his motherland for Shanghai, and found work as a teacher at a French language training center. He is satisfied with his decision, because living in China, he can enjoy full-scale interaction with Chinese culture.
Nowadays, foreigners living and working in China are commonplace in cosmopolitan cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. If so desired, one may take language classes from a foreign teacher, eat dishes cooked by foreign chefs, be ministered to by a foreign beauty therapist at a beauty salon, or enjoy being entertained by foreign performance artists. Exotic stage acts and imported technologies all have, to varying degrees, an influence on Chinese life. Local people no longer have the impression that foreigners working in China are solely senior managers or specialists in foreign-funded enterprises.
Many of the foreigners in China today have come in search of opportunities for a new life. The country's economic achievements and brilliant prospects, and the vitality of everyday life, all combine to give them ample reason to stay here.
According to statistics, more than 60,000 foreigners have obtained work permits in China, and the actual number of foreign employees is much larger. Most foreign workers are hired directly by Chinese companies, and work in the fields of management, marketing, production, finance, catering and education. They come from more than 90 countries and regions, including Japan, the United States, the Republic of Korea, Germany, and Singapore, and are concentrated in larger cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Since China's entry into the WTO, even more foreigners are expected to come to work in China.
Needs
Inside a Boeing 767 fuselage, air stewardesses cordially ask passengers to fasten their seatbelts. Suddenly, the plane begins to shudder violently, and the lights flicker on and off. The cabin is chaos, rent with passengers' shrieks and cries of terror. At this time, air stewardesses guide passengers out through the emergency exit. Finally, two stewardesses rapidly check the entire cabin, and after making sure that no passengers remain, slide down the emergency chute carrying first-aid boxes. This is the "emergency exit" maneuver -- a training program for 12 Japanese air stewardesses employed by Air China.
In 2001, Air China employed 12 stewardesses from Japan, which caused quite a stir. People did not understand this. Chinese stewardesses are fine, why spend more on hiring foreigners?
The far-sighted managers of Air China do not see it this way. Li Fujian, chief of Air China's Labor and Personnel Department, spoke of a questionnaire survey conducted on Sino-Japanese flights. Results showed that Air China operates 40 Sino-Japanese flights every day, and that 60 percent of passengers are Japanese, most of them senior citizens who speak English poorly and have difficulty communicating with air stewardesses. The Japanese people lay great store by the social etiquette with which Chinese stewardesses are not familiar. In the survey, 52 percent of respondents expressed their preference for Japanese stewardesses, which is why Air China took this decision. It resulted in fierce airline competition, and it is reported that since its employment of Japanese air stewardesses, Air China's flight occupancy has increased appreciably.
Air China has made known its intention to employ more foreign stewardesses, when the time is ripe, to enhance its service and bring it to an international level. This move is also expected to promote professionalism in Chinese stewardesses.
Increases in the number of foreign employees reflect China's efforts to be in line with international norms in terms of knowledge, human resources, policy-making, concepts, service, and products. When planning their future development, certain Chinese organizations and enterprises solicit international talents, so as to waste no time in getting into international gear, as only then can they hold their ground in the face of fierce competition. This is undoubtedly a current trend.
Efforts made by foreign employees to enhance exchanges between China and the outside world have also had beneficial results. This is manifest in the person of Bora Milutinovic, Croatian coach to the Chinese National Soccer Team. Probably the most famous employee from abroad, he has brought joy to the Chinese people, especially Chinese soccer fans, and made great contributions to Chinese sports in general.
Alain, chief Framatome representative in China, has worked in China for more than a decade. With his help, the Shanghai No.1 Machinery Tools Factory uses Framatome technologies to manufacture nuclear power plant equipment. These products have earned a high evaluation from the French Supervisory Committee of Science and Technology, and are listed as a WTO recommended product. Lu Huayong, an American, and former tennis professional, has been superintendent of the Heineken Shanghai Open since 1997. He took full advantage of his contacts within tennis circles and knowledge of the game to make the Open a lively, vibrant event. The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) gave the Heineken Shanghai Open a top rating.
Several domestic insurance companies have invested sizable sums of money in the hiring of foreign employees and advisers. The China Ping'an Insurance Company went so far as to invite the vice-president of a famous American company to join the company, and China Pacific Insurance has no intention of being left behind in this regard. Wang Guoliang, chairman of the China Pacific board of directors, announced that recruitment of Chinese and foreign talents would be one of the main measures taken to promote the long-term development of his company, and has worked out related policies.
The above facts show that Chinese enterprises are now out to solicit talents from abroad, and that competition for the "best in the West" has begun.
Channels
Makoto Endo, a Japanese professor in his late 50s, is planning to introduce senior technical personnel from Japan to work in China. The Japan-China Technological and Intellectual Transfer Center, which he represents, has signed a letter of intent with the China Specialists Economic and Technological Advisory Center, under the Chinese Ministry of Personnel. The Sino-Japan Human Resources Development Center, a joint venture, was established in August 2001.
The center stipulates that Japanese technical personnel introduced into China must spend two to five years here. The first batch of 500 Japanese personnel has already arrived and started work in China.
Although China has an abundant labor force, technical workers at the production forefront are not fully versed in all the necessary skills, hence the call for foreign technical personnel. According to statistics, of China's 70 million technical workers, only 5 percent hold senior technical qualifications, and the structure of technical workers is that of a pyramid. This is in direct contrast with developed countries, where those holding senior technical titles make up nearly 40 percent of the technical workforce. According to experts, China's low manufacturing standard is attributable not to the level of its engineers, but to that of its workers.
In 2001, the China International Talents Market, supported by the China State Foreign Experts Bureau, and established by the China Association for the International Exchange of Talents, commenced operation. This is the first entity of its kind in China.
According to responsible market officials, service targets are at an international level, and include the introduction of talents from abroad. This is a permanent intermediary organ and a channel through which to invite foreign experts, and to send personnel abroad to undergo training. The market is currently taking full advantage of support from the State Foreign Experts Bureau, and its main business is locating and inviting foreign experts, such as scientific and technological specialists, university lecturers etc., to work in China. On receiving requests from domestic units, the market mechanism is activated. Apart from local channels of communication, the market also has a website providing information to talents abroad.
Shanghai, which has a concentration of excellent talents from all over the country, is advancing towards cosmopolitan status. Building a mechanism through which to solicit international talents appropriate to its future cosmopolitan level is high on the agenda of its human resource objectives. It has recently been reported that in 2005, Shanghai will be prominent in Asia for talent recruitment, and that in 2015, an international talent-soliciting framework will begin to take shape.
Chen Yanhua, an official with the Foreigners Employment Department of the Beijing Municipal Labor and Social Security Bureau, says that after China's entry into the WTO, the international and domestic talents markets will link up, and that the Chinese employment market will open still wider to foreigners. This means that legal restrictions on foreigners working in China will relax. Foreign employees will include not only technical personnel, but also managers, all of whom will be welcome with open arms. Measures to attract foreign talents are also to be adopted. For instance, China recently began to issue "green cards," which permit entry to China without a visa, to foreign technical personnel, investors and entrepreneurs. The Chinese government is also to provide more services, and to designate specific departments that will provide information and intermediary services to foreigners. All this will promote China's economic development and enhance its competitive power within the international market.
What Have Foreign Employees Brought to China?
Many foreigners regard China as a good place to work. The monthly income of certain high-ranking managerial personnel in some transnational companies is as high as US$ 100,000, and the income tax they pay is therefore considerable.
But the influence of foreign employees is not limited merely to their tax contributions. Dong Keyong, a professor at the Labor and Personnel School of the People's University of China, says that it is fine for domestic companies to employ foreigners in certain key positions, but that they should not go too far in this regard. Various countries take measures to protect their own labor force, and exert strict control over the employment of foreigners. In the current Chinese labor market, supply greatly exceeds demand, so efforts must be made to train Chinese employees.
There are, however, also scholars who think that foreign employees are a testimony to China's increased overall strength. Following developments in the Chinese economy, this phenomenon is likely to continue. The scope of the Chinese employment market is huge, and accepting a calculated number of foreign workers should present no problem. If Chinese employees do not take full advantage of their employment opportunities, or work to full capacity in their positions, then they can blame none but themselves if they lose their jobs.
This is the view of Meng Xiancang, director of the Employment Department of the Beijing Municipal Labor and Social Security Bureau. He says that 16,000 foreigners and 5,000 compatriots from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao have obtained work permits in Beijing, and that 85 percent of them are intermediate or senior managers and specialists. Taking into consideration Beijing's population of 10 million, they should pose no threat to the employment prospects of Beijing inhabitants.
Opinions vary, but one thing is certain -- that China's employment system is undergoing transformation in multiple directions. The increase in the number of foreign employees in catering, hotel management, culture and entertainment, and IT constitutes both a boost and a challenge to China's economic development. Foreign employees also help in communications with the rest of the world, and can tell of the changes that have taken place in China. Following China's entry into the WTO, effectively regulating the entry of foreign employees, and rapidly enhancing the competitive potential of domestic talents is a number one priority.
Read more at http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/e20029/foreigners.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
"IT was Beijing's wealth of opportunity that made me want to come here to work," says Mao Yihui, a bespectacled, round-faced, close-cropped Italian, fluent in Chinese. Mao currently works as English editor on a website in Beijing. He loves music, and in his spare time gets together with five friends from Australia, Canada and Italy to play in the band they have formed, "Big Aeroplane," in which he is drummer. They mainly perform in Sanlitun bars, and are sometimes invited to play at embassies. To him, life in Beijing becomes daily more colorful. He says, "The development of bands here is closely related to the diversity of performance venues. As regards progressive music, Italy lags far behind China."
Alain, from France, became fascinated by Chinese culture on his first sight of Chinese calligraphy. He left his motherland for Shanghai, and found work as a teacher at a French language training center. He is satisfied with his decision, because living in China, he can enjoy full-scale interaction with Chinese culture.
Nowadays, foreigners living and working in China are commonplace in cosmopolitan cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. If so desired, one may take language classes from a foreign teacher, eat dishes cooked by foreign chefs, be ministered to by a foreign beauty therapist at a beauty salon, or enjoy being entertained by foreign performance artists. Exotic stage acts and imported technologies all have, to varying degrees, an influence on Chinese life. Local people no longer have the impression that foreigners working in China are solely senior managers or specialists in foreign-funded enterprises.
Many of the foreigners in China today have come in search of opportunities for a new life. The country's economic achievements and brilliant prospects, and the vitality of everyday life, all combine to give them ample reason to stay here.
According to statistics, more than 60,000 foreigners have obtained work permits in China, and the actual number of foreign employees is much larger. Most foreign workers are hired directly by Chinese companies, and work in the fields of management, marketing, production, finance, catering and education. They come from more than 90 countries and regions, including Japan, the United States, the Republic of Korea, Germany, and Singapore, and are concentrated in larger cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Since China's entry into the WTO, even more foreigners are expected to come to work in China.
Needs
Inside a Boeing 767 fuselage, air stewardesses cordially ask passengers to fasten their seatbelts. Suddenly, the plane begins to shudder violently, and the lights flicker on and off. The cabin is chaos, rent with passengers' shrieks and cries of terror. At this time, air stewardesses guide passengers out through the emergency exit. Finally, two stewardesses rapidly check the entire cabin, and after making sure that no passengers remain, slide down the emergency chute carrying first-aid boxes. This is the "emergency exit" maneuver -- a training program for 12 Japanese air stewardesses employed by Air China.
In 2001, Air China employed 12 stewardesses from Japan, which caused quite a stir. People did not understand this. Chinese stewardesses are fine, why spend more on hiring foreigners?
The far-sighted managers of Air China do not see it this way. Li Fujian, chief of Air China's Labor and Personnel Department, spoke of a questionnaire survey conducted on Sino-Japanese flights. Results showed that Air China operates 40 Sino-Japanese flights every day, and that 60 percent of passengers are Japanese, most of them senior citizens who speak English poorly and have difficulty communicating with air stewardesses. The Japanese people lay great store by the social etiquette with which Chinese stewardesses are not familiar. In the survey, 52 percent of respondents expressed their preference for Japanese stewardesses, which is why Air China took this decision. It resulted in fierce airline competition, and it is reported that since its employment of Japanese air stewardesses, Air China's flight occupancy has increased appreciably.
Air China has made known its intention to employ more foreign stewardesses, when the time is ripe, to enhance its service and bring it to an international level. This move is also expected to promote professionalism in Chinese stewardesses.
Increases in the number of foreign employees reflect China's efforts to be in line with international norms in terms of knowledge, human resources, policy-making, concepts, service, and products. When planning their future development, certain Chinese organizations and enterprises solicit international talents, so as to waste no time in getting into international gear, as only then can they hold their ground in the face of fierce competition. This is undoubtedly a current trend.
Efforts made by foreign employees to enhance exchanges between China and the outside world have also had beneficial results. This is manifest in the person of Bora Milutinovic, Croatian coach to the Chinese National Soccer Team. Probably the most famous employee from abroad, he has brought joy to the Chinese people, especially Chinese soccer fans, and made great contributions to Chinese sports in general.
Alain, chief Framatome representative in China, has worked in China for more than a decade. With his help, the Shanghai No.1 Machinery Tools Factory uses Framatome technologies to manufacture nuclear power plant equipment. These products have earned a high evaluation from the French Supervisory Committee of Science and Technology, and are listed as a WTO recommended product. Lu Huayong, an American, and former tennis professional, has been superintendent of the Heineken Shanghai Open since 1997. He took full advantage of his contacts within tennis circles and knowledge of the game to make the Open a lively, vibrant event. The Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) gave the Heineken Shanghai Open a top rating.
Several domestic insurance companies have invested sizable sums of money in the hiring of foreign employees and advisers. The China Ping'an Insurance Company went so far as to invite the vice-president of a famous American company to join the company, and China Pacific Insurance has no intention of being left behind in this regard. Wang Guoliang, chairman of the China Pacific board of directors, announced that recruitment of Chinese and foreign talents would be one of the main measures taken to promote the long-term development of his company, and has worked out related policies.
The above facts show that Chinese enterprises are now out to solicit talents from abroad, and that competition for the "best in the West" has begun.
Channels
Makoto Endo, a Japanese professor in his late 50s, is planning to introduce senior technical personnel from Japan to work in China. The Japan-China Technological and Intellectual Transfer Center, which he represents, has signed a letter of intent with the China Specialists Economic and Technological Advisory Center, under the Chinese Ministry of Personnel. The Sino-Japan Human Resources Development Center, a joint venture, was established in August 2001.
The center stipulates that Japanese technical personnel introduced into China must spend two to five years here. The first batch of 500 Japanese personnel has already arrived and started work in China.
Although China has an abundant labor force, technical workers at the production forefront are not fully versed in all the necessary skills, hence the call for foreign technical personnel. According to statistics, of China's 70 million technical workers, only 5 percent hold senior technical qualifications, and the structure of technical workers is that of a pyramid. This is in direct contrast with developed countries, where those holding senior technical titles make up nearly 40 percent of the technical workforce. According to experts, China's low manufacturing standard is attributable not to the level of its engineers, but to that of its workers.
In 2001, the China International Talents Market, supported by the China State Foreign Experts Bureau, and established by the China Association for the International Exchange of Talents, commenced operation. This is the first entity of its kind in China.
According to responsible market officials, service targets are at an international level, and include the introduction of talents from abroad. This is a permanent intermediary organ and a channel through which to invite foreign experts, and to send personnel abroad to undergo training. The market is currently taking full advantage of support from the State Foreign Experts Bureau, and its main business is locating and inviting foreign experts, such as scientific and technological specialists, university lecturers etc., to work in China. On receiving requests from domestic units, the market mechanism is activated. Apart from local channels of communication, the market also has a website providing information to talents abroad.
Shanghai, which has a concentration of excellent talents from all over the country, is advancing towards cosmopolitan status. Building a mechanism through which to solicit international talents appropriate to its future cosmopolitan level is high on the agenda of its human resource objectives. It has recently been reported that in 2005, Shanghai will be prominent in Asia for talent recruitment, and that in 2015, an international talent-soliciting framework will begin to take shape.
Chen Yanhua, an official with the Foreigners Employment Department of the Beijing Municipal Labor and Social Security Bureau, says that after China's entry into the WTO, the international and domestic talents markets will link up, and that the Chinese employment market will open still wider to foreigners. This means that legal restrictions on foreigners working in China will relax. Foreign employees will include not only technical personnel, but also managers, all of whom will be welcome with open arms. Measures to attract foreign talents are also to be adopted. For instance, China recently began to issue "green cards," which permit entry to China without a visa, to foreign technical personnel, investors and entrepreneurs. The Chinese government is also to provide more services, and to designate specific departments that will provide information and intermediary services to foreigners. All this will promote China's economic development and enhance its competitive power within the international market.
What Have Foreign Employees Brought to China?
Many foreigners regard China as a good place to work. The monthly income of certain high-ranking managerial personnel in some transnational companies is as high as US$ 100,000, and the income tax they pay is therefore considerable.
But the influence of foreign employees is not limited merely to their tax contributions. Dong Keyong, a professor at the Labor and Personnel School of the People's University of China, says that it is fine for domestic companies to employ foreigners in certain key positions, but that they should not go too far in this regard. Various countries take measures to protect their own labor force, and exert strict control over the employment of foreigners. In the current Chinese labor market, supply greatly exceeds demand, so efforts must be made to train Chinese employees.
There are, however, also scholars who think that foreign employees are a testimony to China's increased overall strength. Following developments in the Chinese economy, this phenomenon is likely to continue. The scope of the Chinese employment market is huge, and accepting a calculated number of foreign workers should present no problem. If Chinese employees do not take full advantage of their employment opportunities, or work to full capacity in their positions, then they can blame none but themselves if they lose their jobs.
This is the view of Meng Xiancang, director of the Employment Department of the Beijing Municipal Labor and Social Security Bureau. He says that 16,000 foreigners and 5,000 compatriots from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao have obtained work permits in Beijing, and that 85 percent of them are intermediate or senior managers and specialists. Taking into consideration Beijing's population of 10 million, they should pose no threat to the employment prospects of Beijing inhabitants.
Opinions vary, but one thing is certain -- that China's employment system is undergoing transformation in multiple directions. The increase in the number of foreign employees in catering, hotel management, culture and entertainment, and IT constitutes both a boost and a challenge to China's economic development. Foreign employees also help in communications with the rest of the world, and can tell of the changes that have taken place in China. Following China's entry into the WTO, effectively regulating the entry of foreign employees, and rapidly enhancing the competitive potential of domestic talents is a number one priority.
Read more at http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/English/e20029/foreigners.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
China Is Still The Best Place To Find A Job
China Is Still The Best Place To Find A Job.
I said way back in December that expats are better off looking for a job in China than they would be back in their home lands. That obviously still holds true as the Huffington Post has just written an article titled Young Americans Going To China For Jobs.
Finding Jobs In China
The article cites the case of Mikala Reasbeck, who could only find a part time job after graduating from college in Boston (counting pills in a chemist at $7 an hour). What did she do? She went to Beijing, knowing that she’d have a better chance of finding a good job in China than she would in the US.
After one week looking for work, she had a full time job teaching English.
That won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s lived in China – there are TEFL jobs (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) everywhere in China. What may come as a slight surprise is the salary she managed to get: 14,000 to 16,000 yuan per month. That’s pretty good for a TEFL position. There are definitely such jobs around, but it’s at the higher end of the market.
Mikala has a degree in writing, literature and publishing, but is not a qualified teacher so I’d say she’s been lucky. I’ve had a similar salary and I’m not qualified teacher either, but then I was teaching ICT. I’d been in the computer industry for 13 years when I got the job, including time spent as a trainer.
Mikala’s not alone – the article reports that many young foreigners, faced with bleak prospects in their own countries, are going to China to look for work. Although many are finding jobs such as teaching English, there’s a growing number who are finding professional positions in their favoured industry.
Getting A Visa
One interesting thing that the article pointed out was that China was preferred as a destination over some other countries, such as Russia and the EU, because it was easier to get a visa to work in China:
Employers need government permission to hire foreigners, but authorities promise an answer within 15 working days, compared with a wait of months or longer that might be required in some other countries.
The article does mention that visa restrictions were tightened ahead of the Beijing 2008 Olympics and while it doesn’t say whether they’ve subsequently been relaxed, it does say that there were more people holding a visa at the end of 2008 than there was at the end of 2007:
Some 217,000 foreigners held work permits at the end of 2008, up from 210,000 a year earlier, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Thousands more use temporary business visas and go abroad regularly to renew them
That would indicate that visa restrictions have been relaxed.
As it also says, there are many more people who do not have an official work permit (ie Z visa). It’s been that way for years. I don’t know of a foreigner in China who hasn’t worked on business visa (F visa) or even a tourist visa (L visa) at one point or another.
There are always issues related to visas when you have a job in China.
Many companies will give you an F visa to start with, then try to switch you over to a Z visa when you’re there. Sometimes it can be done, sometimes you have leave the country and re-enter (hands up all those who’ve had an unexpected holiday in Hong Kong!).
Last time I checked (2007), the rules were that you had to leave the country to change from an F visa to a Z visa. Of course rules change and local authorities sometime seem to be able to bend them (if the company is asking them in the right way).
Do You Need To Speak Chinese?
I don’t speak Chinese (well only a little), but I’ve never had any problems getting a job in China!
In my experience, Chinese language ability is not required for TEFL positions. I’m sure it would be seen as an added bonus, but 99% of people teaching in China either have very limited Chinese language abilities, or none at all. What they do know is usually only what they’ve picked up while they’ve been living in China – they couldn’t speak Chinese when they first arrived.
Of course, getting a professional job in China may be different, but there are possibilities for people who don’t speak Chinese. The article says:
While many jobs require at least a smattering of Chinese, some employers that need other skills are hiring people who do not speak the language.
It cites Bangyibang.com CEO, Grant Yu, who has said he may employ people who cannot speak Chinese if they have other skills:
I don’t believe language is the biggest obstacle in communication, as long as he or she has a strong learning ability.
It also mentions Feng Li, a partner in a private fund that invests in the mining industry, who is planning to recruit foreign employees to read legal documents and communicate with clients abroad.
Of course, the vast majority of professional job vacancies that I’ve seen do state that Mandarin is required, so I’m unsure how many professional vacancies there are that really don’t require Chinese language skills. It wouldn’t hurt to learn Chinese!
Shaun Rein, managing director of China Market Research Group, said that there is more competition for foreigners seeking employment in China, from the well educated, English-speaking Chinese youth of today:
You have a lot of Chinese from top universities who are making $500-$600 a month. Making a case that you are much better than they are is very hard.
In response to the issues of not speaking Chinese and the competition from Chinese graduates, I’ll come back to what I said in my December post:
If you have specialist expertise, you’ll be in demand.
China is still a great place to find a job.
Read more at http://www.jobsinchina.com/blog/china-is-still-the-best-place-to-find-a-job/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
I said way back in December that expats are better off looking for a job in China than they would be back in their home lands. That obviously still holds true as the Huffington Post has just written an article titled Young Americans Going To China For Jobs.
Finding Jobs In China
The article cites the case of Mikala Reasbeck, who could only find a part time job after graduating from college in Boston (counting pills in a chemist at $7 an hour). What did she do? She went to Beijing, knowing that she’d have a better chance of finding a good job in China than she would in the US.
After one week looking for work, she had a full time job teaching English.
That won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s lived in China – there are TEFL jobs (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) everywhere in China. What may come as a slight surprise is the salary she managed to get: 14,000 to 16,000 yuan per month. That’s pretty good for a TEFL position. There are definitely such jobs around, but it’s at the higher end of the market.
Mikala has a degree in writing, literature and publishing, but is not a qualified teacher so I’d say she’s been lucky. I’ve had a similar salary and I’m not qualified teacher either, but then I was teaching ICT. I’d been in the computer industry for 13 years when I got the job, including time spent as a trainer.
Mikala’s not alone – the article reports that many young foreigners, faced with bleak prospects in their own countries, are going to China to look for work. Although many are finding jobs such as teaching English, there’s a growing number who are finding professional positions in their favoured industry.
Getting A Visa
One interesting thing that the article pointed out was that China was preferred as a destination over some other countries, such as Russia and the EU, because it was easier to get a visa to work in China:
Employers need government permission to hire foreigners, but authorities promise an answer within 15 working days, compared with a wait of months or longer that might be required in some other countries.
The article does mention that visa restrictions were tightened ahead of the Beijing 2008 Olympics and while it doesn’t say whether they’ve subsequently been relaxed, it does say that there were more people holding a visa at the end of 2008 than there was at the end of 2007:
Some 217,000 foreigners held work permits at the end of 2008, up from 210,000 a year earlier, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Thousands more use temporary business visas and go abroad regularly to renew them
That would indicate that visa restrictions have been relaxed.
As it also says, there are many more people who do not have an official work permit (ie Z visa). It’s been that way for years. I don’t know of a foreigner in China who hasn’t worked on business visa (F visa) or even a tourist visa (L visa) at one point or another.
There are always issues related to visas when you have a job in China.
Many companies will give you an F visa to start with, then try to switch you over to a Z visa when you’re there. Sometimes it can be done, sometimes you have leave the country and re-enter (hands up all those who’ve had an unexpected holiday in Hong Kong!).
Last time I checked (2007), the rules were that you had to leave the country to change from an F visa to a Z visa. Of course rules change and local authorities sometime seem to be able to bend them (if the company is asking them in the right way).
Do You Need To Speak Chinese?
I don’t speak Chinese (well only a little), but I’ve never had any problems getting a job in China!
In my experience, Chinese language ability is not required for TEFL positions. I’m sure it would be seen as an added bonus, but 99% of people teaching in China either have very limited Chinese language abilities, or none at all. What they do know is usually only what they’ve picked up while they’ve been living in China – they couldn’t speak Chinese when they first arrived.
Of course, getting a professional job in China may be different, but there are possibilities for people who don’t speak Chinese. The article says:
While many jobs require at least a smattering of Chinese, some employers that need other skills are hiring people who do not speak the language.
It cites Bangyibang.com CEO, Grant Yu, who has said he may employ people who cannot speak Chinese if they have other skills:
I don’t believe language is the biggest obstacle in communication, as long as he or she has a strong learning ability.
It also mentions Feng Li, a partner in a private fund that invests in the mining industry, who is planning to recruit foreign employees to read legal documents and communicate with clients abroad.
Of course, the vast majority of professional job vacancies that I’ve seen do state that Mandarin is required, so I’m unsure how many professional vacancies there are that really don’t require Chinese language skills. It wouldn’t hurt to learn Chinese!
Shaun Rein, managing director of China Market Research Group, said that there is more competition for foreigners seeking employment in China, from the well educated, English-speaking Chinese youth of today:
You have a lot of Chinese from top universities who are making $500-$600 a month. Making a case that you are much better than they are is very hard.
In response to the issues of not speaking Chinese and the competition from Chinese graduates, I’ll come back to what I said in my December post:
If you have specialist expertise, you’ll be in demand.
China is still a great place to find a job.
Read more at http://www.jobsinchina.com/blog/china-is-still-the-best-place-to-find-a-job/
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
Saturday, April 21, 2012
China Wealth Exodus Underestimated
China 'wealth exodus' underestimated.
The scale of the exodus of wealth from China caused by investor immigration is much larger than previous estimated, according to China Daily's interviews with emigration agents and experts.
Last month, Legal Evening News, a Beijing metropolis daily, said 10 billion yuan ($1.57 billion) has found its way abroad annually since 2009.
The figure was based on the investor emigration requirement and the number of investor emigrants publicized by the governments of the United States, Canada and Australia. Investor emigrants to those three countries are believed to account for 80 percent of the total number of Chinese emigres.
However, emigration agents said the figure underestimates the real scale. That's because many people will transfer more money to their new 'home' countries once they've obtained permanent residency.
"Usually they will at least buy a house after they get residency," said Cai Hong, a manager with emigration consulting company HHL Overseas Immigration & Education.
"And they usually make a one-off payment,"Ma said, referring to the fact the emigrants have no need to resort to a mortgage.
Considering the average price of a house in the major cities of the United States, Canada and Australia - the countries where Chinese investor emigrants are most likely to settle - and the fact that around 80 percent of them will buy a house, an estimated 10.3 billion yuan finds its way into the property markets of the three countries per annum.
Adding in the money invested to secure permanent residency, which China Daily estimates to be 21.49 billion yuan, and the estimation that the three countries account for 80 percent of the emigrant population, the total wealth exodus could reach at least 39.75 billion yuan a year.
The Canada case
For its safety, relatively short waiting time to obtain permanent residency and good returns on investment, Canada has always been the premier choice for wealthy Chinese looking to obtain permanent residency through investment, emigration agents said.
Prior to 2010, a foreigner simply had to invest C$400,000 ($405,600) and prove net assets of C$800,000 to apply for permanent residency. However, in 2010, Citizenship and Immigration Canada, the country's immigration authority, doubled the threshold to limit the explosion in applications. Demand has been so strong that Canada imposed a cap of 700 applications per annum, starting on July 1, 2011. That quota was quickly filled, with 697 of the 700 applications coming from China.
The cap put a brake on the fever. The number of successful applicants from the Chinese mainland dropped from around 2,000 in 2010 to 697 in 2011, according to figures from the Canadian immigration authority.
However, potential immigrant investors quickly found another point of entry through Quebec's investor immigrant program. Since last July when the federal government's door closed, the Quebec program has seen the initiation of 200 applications from Chinese people every month.
"We expect the federal government's program to reopen this year and another 2,000 Chinese investors will get permanent residency," said Ma Yuan, an emigration expert with J & P Star Consulting Co Ltd, a Beijing-based emigration consultancy.
She said the Canadian program is particular favored by Chinese investors for its safety. Unlike the US program, which requires investment before permanent residency is granted, applicants to Canada invest their funds only after permanent residency is approved. The C$800,000 seed capital is returned to the applicants five years after residency is granted.
Applicants can even invest just C$220,000 and obtain a loan of C$580,000 from Canadian banks to bridge the gap. The C$220,000 will be transferred to the bank that issued the loan as interest five years later.
By comparison, the United States' investor immigrant program, the EB-5 program, despite its lower initial threshold (the minimum investment requirement is $500,000), does not guarantee against a loss of investment, which means that applicants might lose their seed capital and still not obtain permanent residency.
Another reason that people favor Canada is the country's welfare system.
"Most of the investor immigrants go to Canada for their kids' education," Cai said. The country offers free pre-college education for permanent residents, and their children can enjoy a college education at less than one-third of the tuition fee paid by international students pay.
Relatively cheaper house prices are another attraction. A detached house usually costs from C$500,000 to CS$600,000 in Vancouver, and C$400,000 to CS$500,000 in Toronto, much cheaper than in Beijing or Shanghai.
Based on the assumption that 80 percent of the 2,000 investor immigrants would buy a house at an average price of C$500,000, Canada's investor immigrant program alone could draw C$2.4 billion from China.
US a top destination
Despite its risks, the US investor immigration program remains a popular choice for wealthy Chinese.
A total of 2,969 Chinese people applied for the EB-5 visa in the fiscal year 2011, accounting for three-fourths of total applicants, according to figures released by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Although many are still awaiting a decision, 934 permanent residencies have been granted.
The US is the top emigration destination, followed by Canada, Singapore and Europe, according to a joint survey by Bank of China Ltd and the Hurun Report last year. The report found that 60 percent of about 960,000 Chinese with assets of more than 10 million yuan were either thinking about emigrating or taking steps to do so.
Australia, another popular destination, requires foreigners to apply for a provisional visa before applying for permanent residency four years later. There are various visa types under the "Business Skills visas" system, which allows overseas investors, senior executives and entrepreneurial talents to settle in Australia by developing businesses in the country.
For example, the 890/892 visa allows provisional visa holders to obtain residency if they have had an ownership interest in a business in Australia for at least two years, with significant personal and business asset turnover.
Applicants for the "Business Skills visas" from China totaled more than 9,000 last year, nine times the number from South Korea, the second-largest group, according to the Australian immigration authority.
Kevin Stanley, executive director of global real estate consultancy CBRE Group Inc, said it has seen very strong interest from Chinese individuals looking to buy apartments, predominantly for family use and particularly in connection with children studying in Australia.
Chris Bevan, a real estate agent in Melbourne, said that his recent sales to buyers from Shanghai ranged from two bedroom apartments priced at A$300,000 ($314,000) to a luxury beachfront home for A$18 million.
Strong demand from Chinese buyers has already pushed up real estate price worldwide. Investors from the Chinese mainland account for between 20 and 40 percent of foreign property investors in Vancouver, Toronto, London and Singapore, according to a report from the real-estate consultancy Colliers International on Feb 28. In Vancouver, the property price has been pushed 9 percent higher in the last year, because of Chinese investors.
Reaction
People in industries related to the boom, such as the property market and emigration advisory services, have welcomed the trend. Bevan said that Chinese and other foreign investors have helped Australia continue to grow in a market that has seen an international downturn in the last 12 months.
Local residents interviewed by China Daily approved of the development.
John Harper, a town planner in Melbourne, said the total number of Chinese immigrants contributing to population growth in the city was somewhere between 3 to 4 percent.
"I doubt that figure would create a significant impact on house prices," he said.
"You never hear about New Zealand or British immigrants pushing up housing prices. These two groups make up about 30 percent of people moving to Australia, or three times the number of Chinese, I guess," he said.
"I don't really mind the 'influx' of Chinese going for permanent residency. I think there are guidelines and controls overseen by the Australian government," said Jeremy Lam, a financial analyst in Australia. "And these rules and regulations are gradually becoming more and more stringent over time."
But back in China, the news of the wealth exodus has sparked mixed sentiment.
"Nobody in the world can ever stop China's property speculators," according to a sarcastic post from one netizen on the micro blog Sina Weibo.
Some netizens have blamed the domestic cap on property sales imposed by the Chinese government for the overseas purchasing spree.
Chinese experts warn that talent is flowing out with wealth, which is a more worrying trend.
"If this trend continues it will not only hurt the Chinese economy in the long run, but also prevent it from building an 'olive-shaped' society with a large middle class, because a great proportion of the emigrants are middle-class professionals," said Zhang Monan, an economic researcher with the State Information Center.
Read more at http://www.china.org.cn/business/2012-03/16/content_24913514.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
The scale of the exodus of wealth from China caused by investor immigration is much larger than previous estimated, according to China Daily's interviews with emigration agents and experts.
Last month, Legal Evening News, a Beijing metropolis daily, said 10 billion yuan ($1.57 billion) has found its way abroad annually since 2009.
The figure was based on the investor emigration requirement and the number of investor emigrants publicized by the governments of the United States, Canada and Australia. Investor emigrants to those three countries are believed to account for 80 percent of the total number of Chinese emigres.
However, emigration agents said the figure underestimates the real scale. That's because many people will transfer more money to their new 'home' countries once they've obtained permanent residency.
"Usually they will at least buy a house after they get residency," said Cai Hong, a manager with emigration consulting company HHL Overseas Immigration & Education.
"And they usually make a one-off payment,"Ma said, referring to the fact the emigrants have no need to resort to a mortgage.
Considering the average price of a house in the major cities of the United States, Canada and Australia - the countries where Chinese investor emigrants are most likely to settle - and the fact that around 80 percent of them will buy a house, an estimated 10.3 billion yuan finds its way into the property markets of the three countries per annum.
Adding in the money invested to secure permanent residency, which China Daily estimates to be 21.49 billion yuan, and the estimation that the three countries account for 80 percent of the emigrant population, the total wealth exodus could reach at least 39.75 billion yuan a year.
The Canada case
For its safety, relatively short waiting time to obtain permanent residency and good returns on investment, Canada has always been the premier choice for wealthy Chinese looking to obtain permanent residency through investment, emigration agents said.
Prior to 2010, a foreigner simply had to invest C$400,000 ($405,600) and prove net assets of C$800,000 to apply for permanent residency. However, in 2010, Citizenship and Immigration Canada, the country's immigration authority, doubled the threshold to limit the explosion in applications. Demand has been so strong that Canada imposed a cap of 700 applications per annum, starting on July 1, 2011. That quota was quickly filled, with 697 of the 700 applications coming from China.
The cap put a brake on the fever. The number of successful applicants from the Chinese mainland dropped from around 2,000 in 2010 to 697 in 2011, according to figures from the Canadian immigration authority.
However, potential immigrant investors quickly found another point of entry through Quebec's investor immigrant program. Since last July when the federal government's door closed, the Quebec program has seen the initiation of 200 applications from Chinese people every month.
"We expect the federal government's program to reopen this year and another 2,000 Chinese investors will get permanent residency," said Ma Yuan, an emigration expert with J & P Star Consulting Co Ltd, a Beijing-based emigration consultancy.
She said the Canadian program is particular favored by Chinese investors for its safety. Unlike the US program, which requires investment before permanent residency is granted, applicants to Canada invest their funds only after permanent residency is approved. The C$800,000 seed capital is returned to the applicants five years after residency is granted.
Applicants can even invest just C$220,000 and obtain a loan of C$580,000 from Canadian banks to bridge the gap. The C$220,000 will be transferred to the bank that issued the loan as interest five years later.
By comparison, the United States' investor immigrant program, the EB-5 program, despite its lower initial threshold (the minimum investment requirement is $500,000), does not guarantee against a loss of investment, which means that applicants might lose their seed capital and still not obtain permanent residency.
Another reason that people favor Canada is the country's welfare system.
"Most of the investor immigrants go to Canada for their kids' education," Cai said. The country offers free pre-college education for permanent residents, and their children can enjoy a college education at less than one-third of the tuition fee paid by international students pay.
Relatively cheaper house prices are another attraction. A detached house usually costs from C$500,000 to CS$600,000 in Vancouver, and C$400,000 to CS$500,000 in Toronto, much cheaper than in Beijing or Shanghai.
Based on the assumption that 80 percent of the 2,000 investor immigrants would buy a house at an average price of C$500,000, Canada's investor immigrant program alone could draw C$2.4 billion from China.
US a top destination
Despite its risks, the US investor immigration program remains a popular choice for wealthy Chinese.
A total of 2,969 Chinese people applied for the EB-5 visa in the fiscal year 2011, accounting for three-fourths of total applicants, according to figures released by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Although many are still awaiting a decision, 934 permanent residencies have been granted.
The US is the top emigration destination, followed by Canada, Singapore and Europe, according to a joint survey by Bank of China Ltd and the Hurun Report last year. The report found that 60 percent of about 960,000 Chinese with assets of more than 10 million yuan were either thinking about emigrating or taking steps to do so.
Australia, another popular destination, requires foreigners to apply for a provisional visa before applying for permanent residency four years later. There are various visa types under the "Business Skills visas" system, which allows overseas investors, senior executives and entrepreneurial talents to settle in Australia by developing businesses in the country.
For example, the 890/892 visa allows provisional visa holders to obtain residency if they have had an ownership interest in a business in Australia for at least two years, with significant personal and business asset turnover.
Applicants for the "Business Skills visas" from China totaled more than 9,000 last year, nine times the number from South Korea, the second-largest group, according to the Australian immigration authority.
Kevin Stanley, executive director of global real estate consultancy CBRE Group Inc, said it has seen very strong interest from Chinese individuals looking to buy apartments, predominantly for family use and particularly in connection with children studying in Australia.
Chris Bevan, a real estate agent in Melbourne, said that his recent sales to buyers from Shanghai ranged from two bedroom apartments priced at A$300,000 ($314,000) to a luxury beachfront home for A$18 million.
Strong demand from Chinese buyers has already pushed up real estate price worldwide. Investors from the Chinese mainland account for between 20 and 40 percent of foreign property investors in Vancouver, Toronto, London and Singapore, according to a report from the real-estate consultancy Colliers International on Feb 28. In Vancouver, the property price has been pushed 9 percent higher in the last year, because of Chinese investors.
Reaction
People in industries related to the boom, such as the property market and emigration advisory services, have welcomed the trend. Bevan said that Chinese and other foreign investors have helped Australia continue to grow in a market that has seen an international downturn in the last 12 months.
Local residents interviewed by China Daily approved of the development.
John Harper, a town planner in Melbourne, said the total number of Chinese immigrants contributing to population growth in the city was somewhere between 3 to 4 percent.
"I doubt that figure would create a significant impact on house prices," he said.
"You never hear about New Zealand or British immigrants pushing up housing prices. These two groups make up about 30 percent of people moving to Australia, or three times the number of Chinese, I guess," he said.
"I don't really mind the 'influx' of Chinese going for permanent residency. I think there are guidelines and controls overseen by the Australian government," said Jeremy Lam, a financial analyst in Australia. "And these rules and regulations are gradually becoming more and more stringent over time."
But back in China, the news of the wealth exodus has sparked mixed sentiment.
"Nobody in the world can ever stop China's property speculators," according to a sarcastic post from one netizen on the micro blog Sina Weibo.
Some netizens have blamed the domestic cap on property sales imposed by the Chinese government for the overseas purchasing spree.
Chinese experts warn that talent is flowing out with wealth, which is a more worrying trend.
"If this trend continues it will not only hurt the Chinese economy in the long run, but also prevent it from building an 'olive-shaped' society with a large middle class, because a great proportion of the emigrants are middle-class professionals," said Zhang Monan, an economic researcher with the State Information Center.
Read more at http://www.china.org.cn/business/2012-03/16/content_24913514.htm
http://www.languagecorpsasia.com
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